Portadown woman, who injured a child after going through a red light and driving off, gets driving ban at Craigavon court
A woman, who injured a child after driving through a red light and failed to remain at the scene, has been given a driving ban for dangerous driving.
Margaret Walker, aged 68, from Mahon Court, Portadown appeared before Craigavon Magistrates Court charged with dangerous driving, failing to remain at an injury accident, failing to stop at an injury accident and failing to report an injury accident. A charge of breaching a traffic sign was withdrawn.
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The court heard that at 3.50pm on December 19, 2023, police received a report of a road traffic collision involving a pedestrian and a vehicle at the Go Garage on the Armagh Road, Portadown.
When police arrived the vehicle involved in the collision wasn’t at the scene but a witness said the vehicle had ‘momentarily stopped’ but then drove off.
The victim was a child who sat in the witness’ car until an ambulance arrived. He suffered a fractured fibula in his leg.
Police discovered the offending vehicle was a red Renault Captur and tracked the owner down to the defendant Margaret Walker. She admitted to police she was driving the vehicle.
"Police viewed the CCTV which showed the lights changed to red with a vehicle travelling in the opposite direction to Ms Walker stopping and Ms Walker’s vehicle travelling through the red light, colliding with the child who was crossing the road,” said a prosecutor.
She was later charged with dangerous driving and the other charges and made no reply.
“She admitted she had been on the road in question but denied that the light was red even when the CCTV was shown to her, she said she would have stopped if the light had been red,” said the prosecutor.
Walker’s barrister Mr David McKeown said his client had never come before the courts before and has had a “long clear driving history”.
"On the day in question she just didn’t see the child or the light but she accepts that the standard of driving meets the test for dangerous driving in the circumstances,” said Mr McKeown.
“On one hand she is very lucky the child wasn’t more seriously injured as she would have faced a more serious charge. There has been a plea, not at the earliest opportunity but relatively early once we were able to view the CCTV footage of the incident. She couldn’t believe what had happened,” said Mr McKeown, saying losing her licence would have significant issues for the defendant’s family as she is the primary carer for her grandchild.
He added she is “deeply upset about the entire incident and it is entirely out of character”.
District Judge Michael Ranaghan, who noted Walker’s lack of criminal record, said: “You are lucky that you face a charge of dangerous driving only. You did hit a child. You are so lucky that more serious injuries or indeed something worse wasn’t cause to that child.”
He banned Walker from driving for 20 months. For the failing to remain, report and stop charges he banned her from driving for six months each to run concurrently with the first sentence. For dangerous driving she was fined £200 and ordered to pay a £15 offender levy. For the other offences she was fined £100 on each charge.