Disqualified driver ‘found by police dog’ after Louth chase

A disqualified driver who failed to stop for the police in Louth and ended up driving though a hedge before crashing his vehicle, then running away until being found by a police dog, was sentenced by magistrates in Boston yesterday (February 6).
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Court news

Daniel Paul Markillie, 38, admitted driving whilst disqualified and without insurance, as well as failing to stop for the police on Brackenborough Road.

Paul Wood, prosecuting, said police did an automatic number plate check on Markillie’s Citroen C5 when they saw it at 11.10pm on January 15 on the A16, and found that it was registered as being ‘off the road’ so they followed it with their blue lights flashing but it did not stop.

He said the car accelerated away until it went through a hedge into a field and then crashed into a ditch, before the driver got out and ran away until eventually being found hiding under a bridge by a police dog.

Mr Wood said that Markillie, of Middle Road, Wisbech, had been disqualified from driving in 2009 for dangerous driving and had been required to take an extended driving test, but had never done so and was therefore still banned from driving.

Mitigating, Beris Brickles said the original ban had been for 12 months, which he had complied with, but he had not taken a new test so, as he wanted to drive again, he had bought a car which he had left on his drive until ‘he succumbed to temptation’ and drove it to ‘see a girl’.

He said that when Markillie was ‘blue lighted’ he drove away because he knew he had no insurance and did not even think about still being banned.

He said Markillie was a recovering heroin addict and was subject to a community order in Cambridge imposed last November and was undertaking rehabilitation activities.

After hearing that he was not suitable for a curfew or unpaid work, he was fined a total of £200 and ordered to pay £115 in costs 
and charges.