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Driver drinking vodka from 7Up bottle in car crashes into cyclist on bike lane while six times over drink drive limit – and offers victim €2,500 as “token of remorse”

The motorist, whose drink drive reading was “extraordinarily high” according to her defence barrister, has pleaded guilty to drunk driving and careless driving after leaving the cyclist with ongoing pain and discomfort

A motorist who was drinking vodka from a 7Up bottle at the wheel when she struck a cyclist from behind on a cycle lane, leaving the rider with concussion and ongoing pain and discomfort, offered him €2,500 as a “token of remorse” before pleading guilty to careless driving.

33-year-old Dubliner Rebecca Griffith was six times over the legal drink drive limit, a reading described as “extraordinarily high” by her defence counsel at Dublin District Court this week, when she crashed into a 34-year-old cyclist on the city’s Malahide Road at around 5pm on 17 August 2023.

The environmental scientist had finished work at Trinity College Dublin at 3pm on the day of the incident, before visiting her sister. After a row broke out, Griffith purchased a bottle of vodka and poured it into a 7Up bottle, which she drank from while behind the wheel of her car, the Irish Examiner reports.

Shortly before 5pm, she struck the cyclist – who was riding in a bus/cycle lane – from behind, sending him over the handlebars and onto the road. Another cyclist assisted the stricken rider, and he was later taken to hospital by ambulance, where was treated for bruising and concussion, undergoing a CAT scan and receiving a tetanus injection.

> Ourselves Alone (in a car): Sinn Féin councillor claims “crazy” cycle lanes are making roads more dangerous – and are designed for a “privileged” minority

The injuries caused the cyclist to miss work for two weeks, and in a victim impact statement he said he was now nervous while cycling, felt vulnerable on the roads, and suffered from occasional flashbacks, while also suffering from ongoing pain and discomfort.

With police officers immediately noticing in the aftermath of the crash that Griffith had consumed alcohol, the sample she provided revealed a reading of 407mg of alcohol per 100ml of urine – over six times the legal limit of 67mg in Ireland.

In Dublin District Court this week, where Griffith pleaded guilty to drink driving and careless driving, defence counsel Emmett Bolan admitted that his client’s drink drive reading was “extraordinarily high” and said she was lucky not to have caused a fatal injury and be facing a more serious charge.

The 33-year-old driver also issued an unreserved apology through her barrister and in a letter brought to court, and offered the cyclist €2,500 as a “token of remorse”.

> Drug driver who caused horrific crash which seriously injured cyclist avoids jail, given 10-month suspended sentence

Mr Nolan also told the court that Griffith had suffered from a bad alcohol addiction and had been drinking the night before the incident, but added that she was “highly educated and travelled”.

The court heard that she was on antidepressant medication and used alcohol as a coping mechanism, with her family hoping that she would abstain from drinking and engage with counselling and help to deal with the issue.

Pleading for leniency, the barrister asked the court to treat the drink driving collision “as an aberration by a young woman” who had made a significant error in her life, but “otherwise had a lot going for her”.

> Bus company investigates employee filmed driving on cycle lane and pavement

However, Judge Grainne Malone expressed concern that someone could “pour a bottle of vodka into themselves and get behind the wheel of a car”, noting that the offence was “at the high end” of the careless driving scale.

Malone, nevertheless, added that Griffith had no previous convictions and was going to counselling. She adjourned sentencing until January in order to wait for a probation report and to hear further information about the compensation awarded in civil proceedings lodged by the injured cyclist.

Griffith was remanded on bail and ordered not to drive while awaiting the sentencing hearing.

CCTV footage of incident that saw drug driver avoid jail for hitting cyclist (Facebook/Ted Sayers)

While the sentence that awaits this particular drink driver in Dublin is yet to be decided, yesterday we reported that a motorist twice the legal limit for cannabis who hit a cyclist 20 feet into the air, while overtaking another vehicle at a set of traffic lights, causing serious injuries, avoided jail following the shocking crash in Blackburn, also in August 2023.

CCTV footage, shared on Facebook, showed the moment drug driver Danial Arshad lost patience with a stalled motorist and overtook in the lane for oncoming traffic, causing a head-on collision with cyclist Nicholas Cooper.

Arshad pleaded guilty to causing serious injury by careless driving and was sentenced at Preston Crown Court this week to a 10-month sentence, suspended for two years, and received a three-year driving ban.

After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.

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17 comments

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OldRidgeback | 4 weeks ago
1 like

The fact the driver has offered a sum of money as a sign of remorse can be accepted as a legal admission of the driver's guilt. The cyclist could use this as a legal precedent to sue for extensive damages. It begs the question why anyone wouldn't in that instance. I've sero sympathy for the driver.

Avatar
Flâneur replied to OldRidgeback | 4 weeks ago
3 likes

OldRidgeback wrote:

The fact the driver has offered a sum of money as a sign of remorse can be accepted as a legal admission of the driver's guilt. The cyclist could use this as a legal precedent to sue for extensive damages. It begs the question why anyone wouldn't in that instance. I've sero sympathy for the driver.

Well, the fact she pleaded guilty probably works even better...

Offering 'blood money' is pretty standard in RoI courts. The miscreant hopes to reduce their legal punishment by doing so.

One thing I do like about this system is "She adjourned sentencing until January in order to wait for a probation report and to hear further information about the compensation awarded in civil proceedings lodged by the injured cyclist.". Sounds like a more joined-up system and reduces the incentive for the drunken prat to play silly beggars over the civil claim.

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john_smith replied to OldRidgeback | 3 weeks ago
0 likes

Is there any reason to sue unless the driver's insurance fails to pay up?

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the little onion | 4 weeks ago
14 likes

Why so harsh? Surely accidents happen?

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Rendel Harris replied to the little onion | 4 weeks ago
7 likes

the little onion wrote:

Why so harsh? Surely accidents happen?

Yes, it's the usual bias from the young, ignorant, left-wing low-cycle-mileage road.cc commentariat. Which of us hasn't made a mistake at some point equivalent to necking a bottle of vodka whilst driving a motor car? If only we could be more open-minded, understanding, tolerant and forgiving and we'd all get along much better. 

Avatar
wtjs replied to Rendel Harris | 4 weeks ago
0 likes

Which of us hasn't made a mistake at some point equivalent to necking a bottle of vodka whilst driving a motor car?

I think Rendel has underestimated little onion's powers of irony, and repeated his point.

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Rendel Harris replied to wtjs | 4 weeks ago
3 likes

wtjs wrote:

I think Rendel has underestimated little onion's powers of irony, and repeated his point.

No, I totally took his point and knew that he was being ironic, I was just having a little fun in requoting the words of a certain troll from yesterday in this context in order to emphasise how absurd they were - just as the little onion was doing.

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john_smith replied to the little onion | 3 weeks ago
0 likes

When poor mental health and alcoholism are involved, things become a little blurred (no pun intended).

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mdavidford | 4 weeks ago
7 likes

Quote:

[defence counsellor [B|N]olan] added that she was “highly educated and travelled”.

Which was relevant how?

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Rendel Harris replied to mdavidford | 4 weeks ago
8 likes

mdavidford wrote:

Which was relevant how?

Well, she'll have some nice memories to look back on while she does her time and can maybe help other prisoners with education classes.

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brooksby replied to mdavidford | 4 weeks ago
2 likes

I imagine that its similar to when an offender is described as 'doing work for charity', or 'a regular churchgoer', etc etc.

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chrisonabike | 4 weeks ago
12 likes

Been said elsewhere and maybe it's just "semantics"

... BUT how is purchasing a bottle of vodka, pouring it into a 7Up bottle, and then driving (while already being on some other meds) "careless"?

The legal guidance says:

police wrote:

The offence of dangerous driving is when driving falls far below the minimum standard expected of a competent and careful driver, and includes behaviour that could potentially endanger yourself or other drivers

Examples of dangerous driving are: [...] driving under the influence of drink or drugs, including prescription drugs

Although it goes on:

police wrote:

Driving whilst under the influence of alcohol or drugs (legal and illegal) is a specific offence, but can also be considered as dangerous or careless driving.

... the mention of careless in my view rather dilutes it.

But I still don't see how you can a) choose to intoxicate yourself and drive and b) then actually drive into someone - and that then be held only careless driving?

Is it that the law effectively enacts a ladder of offense - then having set the top (I deliberately chose to drive into a selected victim, yelling "die!") everything else therefore gets discounted in some way ("they passed out drunk and hit someone - that must be a lesser offense than being pissed but conscious and driving into someone...")?

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I love my bike replied to chrisonabike | 4 weeks ago
0 likes

(Note that this happened in Dublin, Republic of Ireland)

Being an alcoholic, drinking clearly wasn't a one-off event. Hopefully being a highly educated person, the driving-free period before sentancing will be a life-long change, whatever her sentence. And, as a travelled person, she'll know that lots of people choose to live without driving.

From Irish Examiner 'Pleading for leniency, the barrister asked the court to treat it as an aberration by a young woman'

An aberration - If only because she hasn't crashed whilst drunk until now! (but for leniency?)

Hopefully the €2,500 as a “token of remorse” was simply how much she got for selling her car.

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chrisonabike replied to I love my bike | 4 weeks ago
1 like
I love my bike wrote:

(Note that this happened in Dublin, Republic of Ireland)

Thanks, noted. See the appropriate law!

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brooksby replied to chrisonabike | 4 weeks ago
4 likes

chrisonabike wrote:

... BUT how is purchasing a bottle of vodka, pouring it into a 7Up bottle, and then driving (while already being on some other meds) "careless"?

Attempting to hide it by pouring it into an innocuous container seems like it ought to make her offence worse 

Avatar
mdavidford | 4 weeks ago
3 likes

Maths pedantry corner:

Quote:

while six times over drink drive limit

...

over six times the legal limit

These are not the same thing. (Slightly more than) six times the limit == (slightly more than) five times over the limit.

Avatar
mitsky | 4 weeks ago
7 likes

I had no response from the Met police when reporting this driver who appeared to be drinking whilst behind the wheel.
https://youtu.be/hw071PAofHQ

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