A disqualified driver told police he wished his 9-year-old had taken the wheel.
At 9.20am on May 10, Donald Noel Collins-Roberts, 38, had his children in the car and decided to stop off at the Brockville dairy, the Dunedin District Court heard this week.
On his way home, he spotted a police unit and pulled over.
Court documents showed the comments he made to police: "If he didn’t have his children in the motor vehicle or if he had kicked his children out, he would have fled police to avoid the charge."
"He also stated that he wished he had gotten his 9-year-old son to drive. That way he wouldn’t have got into trouble."
Counsel Noel Rayner said the man had trouble expressing himself and the comments were "throwaway remarks".
"In part, it was an expression of his own frustration at the predicament he had put himself in."
Judge Emma Smith said Collins-Roberts was a recidivist offender with an "unimpressive list of previous convictions".
"You acted in a vile and arrogant way ... your counsel says it was flippant and off the cuff, but it’s just arrogant," she said.
The man had reportedly been making strides to improve his life and his offending had all but stopped despite the instance of aggravated disqualified driving.
"You are trying to do the right thing," Judge Smith said.
Collins-Roberts was sentenced to 180 hours’ community work and ordered to pay court costs of $130.
— Erin Cox, PIJF court reporter
