Care worker who crashed car with beer can in hand and child in back seat is jailed

A care assistant in a Dublin Hospital who crashed her car in West Dublin while drinking a can of beer and while her one-year-old child was sitting in the back seat has been jailed for 28 days by Blanchardstown District Court.

Sentencing the woman, Judge David McHugh told the court that the woman “thoroughly deserves the sentence”. He told the court Garda: “Take her down”.

The woman (34), who has an address in the inner City and who cannot be identified for legal reasons, pleaded guilty to being drunk-in-charge of a vehicle and with being drunk in charge of a child contrary to Section 9 of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1908, at Nangor Road, Clondalkin on June 24, 2018.

Sgt Maria Callaghan said that at 3.30pm on June 24 last, the gardaí responded to a report that a car was crashed in the bus lane on the Nangor Road. She said gardaí found the female slumped over the steering wheel with an open can of beer in her hand. She said the woman was slurring her words.

There was a one-year-old child sitting in the back of the car. The woman was taken to Clondalkin Garda Station where she supplied a blood sample to a doctor. The sample read 219mg alcohol over 100ml blood.

Sgt Callaghan said the woman had no previous convictions.

Defence lawyer Valerie Buckley said Tusla had carried out an investigation and deemed no further action was necessary. She said her client is a single mother and works as a care assistant in a Dublin hospital. On the date in question her client had worked six 12 hour night shifts in a row and was going to a birthday party.

She said if the defendant was convicted of the charge of being drunk in charge of a child, she would lose her job.

The judge said the maximum sentence for the 1908 offence was a fine of 40 shillings with a months imprisonment with or without hard labour. He said he was satisfied there had been an appalling breach of trust. He fined the woman €200 euro and imposed a three-year road ban for the drunk in charge offence.

He said he was satisfied that the second offence merited a prison sentence and that the defendant “thoroughly deserves the prison sentence”.