Corri Drew had used drugs – both cannabis and speed – in the days before he chose to speed away from police at 100km/h in a residential area of Wodonga.
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His Ford station wagon was spotted on Victoria Cross Parade at 9.30am on October 22 by State Highway Patrol police who realised the car was unregistered.
But instead of pulling over, Drew – who had two male passengers in the car – accelerated away at a speed officers estimated to be between 90km/h and 100km/h.
He turned left onto Beechworth Road and overtook a car across solid white lines, and continued along Yarralumla Drive and Castle Creek Drive, where he was finally stopped by police after a four-kilometre pursuit through the 60km/h zones.
They discovered a long list of reasons why Drew should not have been on the road.
He had never held a licence and the Ford station wagon he was driving was unroadworthy due to balding tyres and a loose rear bumper bar.
An oral fluid test also came back positive, and Drew admitted he had used cannabis the night before and speed three days earlier.
He appeared in Wodonga Magistrates’ Court to plead guilty to charges including dangerous driving, failing an oral fluid test and driving an unroadworthy vehicle.
Magistrate Stella Stuthridge sentenced him to a six-month community corrections order, with 50 hours of unpaid community work, and disqualified him from holding a driver’s licence for six months.
She questioned why the case had taken nine months to get to court, especially because the toxicology testing to prove the drug use had come back in November.
Solicitor Geoff Clancy said Drew had served four months in jail for unrelated matters since this offence took place, but the police did not have the driving matters ready to be heard at the same time.
“This matter should have come to court before January,” he said.
“This all happened at a time where he was running hot and doesn’t care … the four months in custody was a real eye-opener for him.”
The court heard he had a partner and a child and Ms Stuthridge said she did not want to hold him back from responsible driving longer than needed.
“It just concerns me that for a young man, he’s perpetually without a licence and perpetually prevented from starting a normal life,” she said.
