Published: Wednesday, 20th August, 2008 12:30
Hit-and-run driver loses appeal against jail term
By Nicola Findlay
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Hit-and-run victims John and Joanne Macdonald have struggled to rebuild their lives following the accident which left them both seriously injured.
Pic by: Jan van der Merwe
A SPEEDING driver who mowed down a couple on a pedestrian crossing has had his appeal against his sentence thrown out by the court.
Mohammed Ahmed (20) ploughed into John and Joanne Macdonald in Alloa’s Greenside Street on 4 October 2006, leaving them for dead.
The couple say their lives have been torn apart with neither of them being able to work since the accident due to the horrific injuries they sustained.
Sheriff David Mackie sentenced Ahmed to 12 months’ detention and banned him from driving for five years in December of last year at Alloa Sheriff Court, but he was released from custody in February of this year pending his appeal, claiming that his sentence was excessive.
John and Joanne, who now live in Bonnybridge, have had to endure months of delays before Ahmed’s appeal was finally heard last week, and say they are relieved that he will serve his sentence and is back behind bars.
John told the Advertiser, “We are delighted that his appeal has been thrown out – it is justice for myself and my wife as our lives will never be the same again.
“It was devastating that he pled guilty yet wasn’t willing to do his time and we really thought he was going to get away with it.
“We’re just glad there weren’t any mistakes and that the judge at the court of appeal made the right decision.
“The delays weren’t helping my wife at all. She still suffers a great deal emotionally and physically and we had to move away from Alloa because every time we passed where we were hit it brought it all flooding back.
“And we are still fighting the insurance company for the claim which has just added to the stress.
“Our only regret is that he didn’t get a tougher sentence but we just have to battle on, try to put this behind us and get on with our lives as best as we can.”
Ahmed pled guilty to a reduced charge of driving culpably and recklessly causing severe injury to John and Joanne, who were propelled 20-30 feet in the air.
He lost control of the Vauxhall Corsa he was driving, ploughing into the couple who had gone out for a quiet drink to mark the anniversary of their daughter Gillian’s death.
Joanne was thrown on to the bonnet of the Corsa and smashed into the windscreen, suffering a brain haemorrhage which has left her with severe headaches, dizzy spells, and memory problems.
She still has to attend a head injuries clinic in Edinburgh and is on medication.
John landed 20 feet away in bushes and sustained multiple fractures including a fractured pelvis, which was potentially life threatening. He spent four months in hospital recovering but will have to walk with a stick for the rest of his life.
The Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh heard last week that Ahmed faced serving only seven weeks of the one-year custodial sentence imposed on him, and a senior defence counsel said that even he was surprised that Mohammed Ahmed faced being freed wearing an electronic tag at that stage.
Gordon Jackson QC said Ahmed went into custody on 6 December last year and would have been eligible for release under the tagging scheme in under two months.
Mr Jackson told the appeal judges, “I have confirmation from the Scottish Prison Service that he would have been considered for release under home detention curfew on 23 January.
“He would have been tagged within about seven weeks. Even I was surprised at that. So much so that I have printed out a Scottish Government circular on home curfew.
“It is a policy that young men with non-violent and non-sex offences, of good character and not having caused particular bother, get tagged extremely early.”
Mr Jackson went on to say that custody had been “a seriously difficult experience” for Ahmed.
He said the asthmatic had been sent to Polmont Young Offenders’ Institution initially but found he was due to be a witness at a trial of another inmate, who was accused of committing offences against a retail business run by his father, and had to be moved, losing his place in the tagging queue.
The defence counsel said Ahmed had been of good character and very much regretted what had happened in the offence.
He had a supportive family and intended to study accountancy, said Mr Jackson.
The lawyer argued that the appeal judges could now deal with the case in a way that did not require Ahmed to be returned to prison, even for a short period, and said that the offence did not involve a course of continuous bad driving.
But Lord Osborne, who heard the appeal with Lord Mackay, rejected the challenge to the sentence.
The senior judge said, “While the driving involved in this offence of dangerous driving at excessive speed was of short duration, we consider that it was very bad driving indeed.
“The consequences of the resulting accident were catastrophic for the two persons who were severely injured.”
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