A ‘family man’ who hit speeds of 100mph in a Transit van while carrying cans of stolen fuel was spared an immediate prison sentence.
On Thursday (April 6), Oxford Crown Court heard that police officers tried to pull Kidlington man Tony Fuller’s van over shortly before midnight on March 3 after spotting it accelerate to 50mph in a 30 zone.
Rather than stop and explain himself to the police, Fuller put his foot down and hit speeds of 100mph during the ensuing 15 minute chase.
Dash cam footage from the panda car pursuing the van showed the Transit overtake a vehicle on the wrong side of the road, cross solid white lines and go through a red light without stopping.
The van was doing 90mph as it entered 30 zones in Kidlington. By that point other police officers had managed to get ahead of the van, lay in wait then threw a ‘Stinger’ device designed to deflate a vehicle’s tyres across the road in front of the speeding Transit.
The Stinger successfully punctured one of the Transit’s front tyres.
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Having only three functioning wheels did not, however, prevent Fuller from reaching 80mph through the town.
Fuller managed to avoid a second Stinger device but the traffic officers finally brought the van to a halt with what the court heard described as a ‘hard stop’, using their patrol cars to block the Transit’s escape.
The manoeuvre failed to prevent Fuller from fleeing on foot. He was arrested soon afterwards. Inside the van were two passengers as well as canisters containing stolen diesel.
Fuller, of Thorne Close, Kidlington, pleaded guilty at the magistrates’ court to dangerous driving, driving without insurance and using false registration plates. He had no previous convictions.
Mitigating, Eiran Reilly said his client had only recently obtained his HGV driver’s licence, working hard to ‘overcome the difficulties of dyslexia’. Inevitably, he had lost his job as a truck driver as a result of his arrest for dangerous driving.
The father of three, the youngest of whom was still a baby, had been offered a job as a mechanic in a garage close to his home.
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“This is a young man who apart from this one mistake has been a good and beneficial member of society,” the barrister said. Almost two dozen character references had been supplied by family, friends and a former employer.
Mr Reilly said Fuller was ‘embarrassed and ashamed’ to find himself in court. He had done a ‘stupid thing’ and understood the seriousness of his situation.
Imposing a 12 months' imprisonment suspended for two years, Judge Michael Gledhill KC asked the defendant: “What on earth are you doing, allowing somebody to put on false plates to your van and getting yourself involved in stealing diesel and then driving like a maniac when the police tried to stop you?
“That’s the question I ask myself. I simply don’t understand it.”
Fuller was banned from the roads for a year and will not be able to get back behind the wheel until he has passed an extended retest.
He must complete 120 hours of unpaid work, up to 40 rehabilitation activity days and pay £425 in costs.
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