Sheriff shocked at Sutherland teenagers' driving
A sheriff was so shocked to hear at Dornoch Sheriff Court this week how two Sutherland teenagers had driven their vehicles on the A9 through Cambusavie to Culgower, in March, that he took the unusual step of publicly speaking out.
Sheriff David Sutherland spoke after hearing the Crown account of the way Allan Gordon, Altass, Lairg, and Craig Mackenzie, Strathy, had driven on the morning of 7th March.
The two had admitted dangerous driving and were each fined £750, banned from driving for 18 months and told to re-sit their driving test.
Unlike some of his colleagues on the bench, Sheriff Sutherland is not verbose and rarely passes comments on sentencing offenders, but in this instance he was so appalled at the possible consequences of the pair’s recklessness, that he decided to speak out.
He told the pair: “By anyone’s measure this was an incredibly appalling piece of driving and it is fortunate that both of you are standing here.
“We see deaths on our Highland roads so often and so many of them are because of young, inexperienced drivers, driving in a mad fashion like this and at such speed.
“Not only could you have killed yourselves, but you could have killed others and the fact that one is slightly late for college (as claimed) is of little consequence when you compare it with what could have been the result.”
* For full report of this court case, and others, see this afternoon’s Northern Times.