10 months prison for dangerous driver who lead Garda on pursuit
A DANGEROUS driver has been sentenced to 10 months in prison after leading gardai on a high-speed pursuit in Clondalkin.
Jordan Carroll was also banned from driving for six years after a court heard he nearly collided with vehicles including a patrol car.
Blanchardstown District Court
Carroll, aged 21, with an address at Lindisfarne Vale, Clondalkin pleaded guilty to dangerous driving and having no insurance during the incident between Kilcronan Avenue and Bawnogue Road on February 22 last year.
He also admitted stealing two bikes, trespassing in several back gardens and damaging a slide as he tried to flee from gardai in other incidents in Lucan on March 3 this year.
Judge Gerard Jones made the 10 month sentence concurrent to a prison sentence Carroll is already serving.
Garda Grace Lumsden told Blanchardstown District Court in the road incident she went to stop a car with the headlights out in the early hours of the morning, activating the patrol car’s blue light and siren.
The car took off at speed, narrowly missed colliding with the patrol car and mounted a footpath. It crossed a green area and failed to yield as it went through two roundabouts. It narrowly avoided colliding with one of the roundabouts and another car.
The gardai lost sight of the car, but stopped it again the next day following another chase.
Carroll was a passenger this time and gardai recognised him as the driver from the earlier incident.
In the Lucan offences, the accused ran from gardai who were called out to a report that two men were rifling through a car in the Doddsborough Cottages area.
Carroll jumped into several back gardens in the Shackleton area, causing damage to a slide as he tried to get over a wall.
The court heard that also on March 3, he stole two bicycles with a combined value of €1,384 from the back garden of a house.
Carroll had a number of previous convictions.
He was already in custody when he appeared in court, serving a sentence for being a passenger in a stolen car and endangering traffic. His release date was in 2023.
Barrister Jennifer Jackson, defending, said her client only had a vague recollection of the offences as he was out of his mind on tablets at the time.
An addiction to tablets and cannabis was behind his offending, Ms Jackson said.
Carroll had had an incredibly difficult upbringing and his parents had died when he was a teenager. He had not been given any opportunities and was “let down by the State,” she said.
