Portlaoise Court: Drug-driver was ‘off her head on cocaine’

GARDAÍ had to take evasive action in their squad car to avoid a collision when a vehicle came around a bend on the wrong side of a road in Mountmellick.

Later that night, 4 August 2022, they encountered the same car they had observed earlier. This time it was swerving back and forth across a continuous white line in the town.

The defendant, who had been summoned to Portlaoise District Court for drug-driving at Manor Road and with failing to provide gardaí with her details at Acragar, Mountmellick failed to appear when her case was called.

Judge Andrew Cody noted that the summons had been served correctly on Lauren Kelly, 149 The Hermitage, Borris Road, Portlaoise and asked for the case to proceed in her absence.

An detective garda who had been driving the squad car said the first incident occurred at 1.05am that morning while he was on patrol. He said that as he was driving around a sharp bend on Manor Street, a car came at speed towards him on the wrong side of the road, forcing him to take evasive action to avoid a collision.

Later that night at 9.43pm while driving along O’Moore Street he spotted the same car as it turned left onto Manor Road. He followed and observed the vehicle swerving back and forth across a continuous white line.

He stopped Ms Kelly, enquiring about the earlier incident and asked for her details.

The detective said that the 23-year-old defendant replied: “I don’t know what you’re talking about. She became very irate and started shouting at me for stopping her. I observed that she was very sedated looking and I formed the opinion that she was under the influence of an intoxicant.” 

 He said he took a roadside oral swab test from the defendant, which returned a positive reading for cocaine. She was then arrested and taken to Portlaoise Garda Station, where a doctor was called to take a voluntary blood sample from her. He said that the sample returned a reading of 429ng/ml.

The detective said that Ms Kelly is the registered owner of the car. He said he had not seen her driving it on the first occasion.

Defending barrister Anne Doyle said: “My client has not had a fair trial. Disclosure (prosecution must disclose to the defence all relevant evidence that it has gathered in its investigations) was not provided to the defendant. There was no evidence given by the garda informing her that she was entitled to legal representation while she was in custody.” 

 Ms Doyle said the gardaí told her they had attempted to contact Ms Kelly to appear in court, but said that they believed she was out of the country. She said that the prosecuting detective had not produced evidence to show how he had contacted Ms Kelly and how he knew that she was out of the country.

However, he replied that while at Ms Kelly’s flat, her flatmate was present and was ‘facetiming” her.

Judge Andrew Cody said it was not the first time that the case had been in court. He said that on the last occasion, Ms Kelly wasn’t present either and a date had been set for a full hearing into it.

He said: “Ms Kelly is not here to contest the garda’s evidence.” The court heard that the defendant had five previous convictions, including possession of drugs, money laundering and breach of Covid travel restrictions.

Ms Doyle said that she had no formal instructions from her client in proffering mitigation and “it appears she has issues with drugs”.

Noting that the cocaine reading was 429ng/ml, Judge Cody said: “That’s almost nine times over the permitted legal limit. This lady was undoubtedly off her head on cocaine.” 

 He went on to convict Ms Kelly of drug-driving, fined her €500 and disqualified her from driving for four years. For failing to provide details to gardaí, she was fined €500 and disqualified from driving for two years.

Recognisances were fixed in the event of an appeal.