Liam Collier, 20, of Kyabram, pleaded guilty in Echuca Magistrates’ Court to two counts of disqualified driving, unlicensed driving, drug driving, driving an unregistered vehicle and using false number plates.
Prosecutor Leading Senior Constable Michael Petrov told the court police saw Collier’s vehicle upturned in a table drain on the side of Midland Hwy at Corop on July 27 last year.
They saw Collier walking further down the road and he admitted he had been driving.
Police found his licence had been disqualified three months earlier and an oral drug test showed methamphetamines.
Leading Sen Constable Petrov also told the court that three months earlier, on April 22, 2020, police caught Collier driving in Kyabram on a driver’s licence that had been cancelled 18 days earlier.
Collier told police at the time he had not received anything to say his licence had been cancelled.
Collier was also picked up by police on Australia Day this year, again driving unlicensed.
The car he was driving was also unregistered and the number plates on it belonged to a different car.
Collier’s solicitor Madeline French told the court her client started hanging out with the wrong people and using cannabis and methamphetamines after breaking up with his girlfriend in April 2020.
She also said Collier had been diagnosed with depression and anxiety.
However, she said he had since distanced himself from the “negative people” and had been "clean" of drugs since February this year.
“The offending occurred largely due to his drug habits,” Miss French said.
“He’s unlikely to re-offend now because he is not using drugs and has disassociated with those people.”
Magistrate Sharon McRae berated Collier for driving without a licence several times and with drugs in his system on one of those occasions.
“It was a serious accident where a vehicle overturned and someone could have died,” she said.
“You are putting the lives of others at risk.”
She told Collier he should have asked for help if he needed it after the break-up.
Collier’s driver’s licence was cancelled for six months for driving without a licence, and cancelled for a further 12 months on the drug driving charge.
He was also fined $1000.
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