The Court of Appeal has upheld a four-year driving disqualification imposed on Eddie Osagie after drugs were found in his vehicle at a Garda checkpoint in Mallow.
Osagie had been sentenced at Cork Circuit Criminal Court on November 23, 2020 to two years’ imprisonment, with the final year suspended, after pleading guilty to possession of drugs under section 15 of the Misuse of Drugs Act. His appeal was directed only at the separate four-year driving ban.
The case arose on January 3, 2020 when Gardaí stopped Osagie at a routine checkpoint in Mallow. Officers detected what they believed was a cannabis smell and searched the vehicle. Two packages weighing just over one kilogram were recovered.
The material had a paste-like consistency and was said to contain cannabis, beans and possibly other substances. A value of €20,414 was initially placed on the seizure and a more serious section 15A charge was proposed. The defence challenged that valuation, however, and the prosecution ultimately proceeded on the lesser section 15 offence.
At sentencing, the judge raised the possibility of disqualification because Osagie had used the car to transport drugs. The court was also told of a 2015 no-insurance conviction which had previously resulted in a two-year driving ban.
On appeal, Osagie argued that the vehicle was merely incidental to the drugs offence and that insufficient consideration had been given to the practical consequences of losing his licence. He ran a barber shop in Cork city while living in rural County Cork, and his family also relied on him for transport.
The Court of Appeal rejected those arguments. It held that the vehicle had been used in the commission of the offence, bringing the case within section 27 of the Road Traffic Act 1961.
The court accepted that another judge might have imposed a shorter ban, but found that four years remained within the permissible range. The appeal was dismissed.