#170 Sandgate Drink Driving

Join Wiseman Lawyers Traffic Lawyer Andrew Wiseman at Sandgate Magistrates Court as he represents a client charged with Drink Driving. Watch Andrew explain what happened in the courtroom, along with the outcome which he achieved and how he achieved it.

All right. Today I'm at Sandgate magistrates court. Client was charged with mid-range, drink driving whilst on his P's. So reading at point 118 whilst on P plates, he did come off the road and was involved in a single-vehicle accident. So, I'm not going to go into the details of the collision, but he came off the road and basically the vehicle was inoperable and I'll leave it at that. But anyway, so point 118 on P's. He wasn't eligible to apply for a DUI drink driving work licence, because to be eligible, you need to be holder of a current open Queensland driver's licence when intercepted. So if you're on your P's, you're not eligible. If you hold an interstate licence, you're not eligible, and if you hold an international licence, you're not eligible. So, as I said, he didn't have an open Queensland driver's licence, so he was not eligible to apply for a DUI drink driving work licence.

So my job was one of getting the disqualification down as low as possible, as opposed to, as I said, getting any kind of work licence. Worst case scenario for mid range, is a 12 month loss of licence, mandatory minimum low or mid when you're on your P's is three months. And if you're on your opens and it's mid at three months, anyway, if it's low range and you're on your P's, it's three months again, as opposed to one month for opens.

So he faced the worst case. Disqualification of 12 months, mandatory minimum three months. As a part of preparing, I got him to do the reformatory course, I get all of my clients to do. I did up an affidavit speaking about what he learned, got him to get character references based on the template that we give all of our clients, guiding the referees as to who the character references need to be addressed to and the key points they need to cover. I mean, there's no point in going to court and handing up a character reference from somebody who speaks of how you're a fantastic person, yet it makes no mention whatsoever of the fact that they know that you're being charged with the offence. So if you're going to hand up a reference as a part of a court matter, the person writing the reference needs to say, "I'm aware that this person's being charged with drink driving, but not withstanding, he's still a fantastic person."

I emailed my client about an eight page form to fill out in his own time. I mean, there's no point of me sitting down, looking at them, asking them to spill their heart to me. It puts too much pressure on a person. And particularly if someone's got mental health issues, they don't need me leering at them trying to get them to, in a quick fashion, tell me their life story. So I email them a form, it's about eight pages, prompting them to, in their own time and at their own leisure, give me their life story, so that I can take what they've told me about themself and factor it into my submissions to the magistrate. Cause at the end of the day, my job is to put the magistrate in the shoes of my client. And by the art of persuasion, convincing the magistrate that if they were in the situation that my client was in, they may very well have made a similar mistake.

In any event, so I got him to fill that form out, requested the police brief. Once I had both, I prepared my submissions. I met my client at court this morning. I went in. So my goals were twofold, to get the disqualification down as low as possible. And also given he's a young person, newly entered in the workforce, and he had sort of aspirations that I'm not going to cover now, which may have been impacted with the recording of conviction. He had concerns about that. And so the second element of my goal was to try to persuade the magistrate, not to record a conviction. So again, try to get the disqualification down as low as possible and get him back on the road ASAP, and try to get no condition recorded, given the issues that I've just alluded to, but I'm not going to elaborate further on.

Went into the court, made my submissions. I had to speak, I won't say length, but I had to go into a reasonable amount of detail about why I wanted what I wanted, but ultimately I was successful on both fronts. So I was successful in persuading the magistrate, not to go past the mandatory minimum three month disqualification. As I said at the start. If you mid range, which my client was, irrespective of whether you are on your opens or your P's, it's a mandatory minimum three months. So it was never going to be any less than that. And I was successful in persuading the magistrate to leave it at the minimum three months. And I was also successful in persuading the magistrate, not to record a conviction.

So mandatory minimum, three months disqualification, modest fine, no conviction recorded. Client's very happy and relieved, as is his family, who were all in attendance. I'm Andrew Wiseman. Thanks for watching.