Police detected 89 driving offences in Hobsons Bay and Maribyrnong as part of Operation Amity over the Australia Day weekend, with one driver giving an unusual excuse for travelling at more than double the speed limit.
Hobsons Bay highway patrol officers clocked a car travelling at 136km/h in a 60km/h section of Central Avenue, Altona Meadows, on Australia Day eve.
Leading Senior Constable Norman Macdonald said the driver was intercepted as he turned right into Merton Street.
“His excuse was, ‘I was dying for a shit’. We actually escorted him home and had him leave the car out the front in the street and he was allowed to go to the toilet,” he said of the 36-year-old Altona Meadows man.
“But he’d already passed several service stations, even McDonald’s down there; he could have stopped at any one of them and gone to the toilet.
“Mind you, I suppose everybody feels more comfortable in their own toilet, but that’s no reason to be doing 136.”
Hobsons Bay police detected seven speeding offences, 10 unregistered vehicles, two drink-drivers, six unlicensed drivers, four drivers who were disqualified or suspended, two mobile phone offences, two drivers disobeying signs or signals and one seatbelt offence. Two vehicles were impounded.
No drug offences were detected in Hobsons Bay or Maribyrnong, with highway patrol members not yet qualified to administer the oral fluid test.
“We haven’t been trained as yet, but we’re expecting to be soon because up until now it’s always been booze buses doing it,” Leading Senior Constable Macdonald said.
“But if we feel that a person is under the influence of drugs or alcohol, we can still ask them to come back and we get somebody out to do a drug impairment test.”
Footscray’s Inspector Tony Long said the operation delivered a mixed bag of results.
“Firstly, the great news is that we have managed to complete the period without any fatalities – none here in Maribyrnong nor anywhere else in Victoria, which is a sensational result,” he said.
“On the down side, our focused efforts saw three people charged with alcohol-related driving offences, which is disgraceful. The risk is not worth it.”
