A CARLISLE motorist trying to avoid a speeding fine gave the name of a man who had been deported from the country when asked to identify the offending driver.

Kaywan Mohammadi, 24, was spared prison by a judge today (tues) but told he had been “very foolish” to lie in his bid to cheat justice.

The city’s crown court heard how Mohammadi, of Bower Street, had been caught speeding on the M6 near Carlisle between junctions 42 and 43. He was travelling at 62mph in a 50mph zone through roadworks  at 11-42am on March 4 in a white Volkswagen Golf heading southbound.

Photographic evidence captured the offence. Mohammadi was written to and asked to identify the driver of the vehicle.

“Had you done what you should have done, which was to simply own up,” Recorder Tony Hawks told him as he stood in the dock, “there may well have been no conviction of any sort at all.

“At worst you would have had to pay a fixed penalty and you would have three points imposed on your licence. That would have been the end of the matter. However, you decided to be dishonest.”

Instead of providing his own name, Mohammadi — a man of Kurdish/Romanian descent — gave that of a Romanian national who had been deported from the UK some time earlier.

“You tried to lie your way out of it again,” said Recorder Hawks said of the defendant’s false communication with the authorities. This occurred during a period between March and October last year.

“If you were someone with previous convictions for dishonesty or if in this case you had seriously derailed the system of justice or had brought suspicion and difficulties upon an innocent man or woman, you would have been sent straight to prison,” the judge told him.

“Offences of this sort are extremely serious and are inevitably met with prison.”

But in view of Mohammadi’s age, the circumstances of the offence and contents of a probation service pre-sentence report, Recorder Hawks opted to suspend a nine-month jail term for 12 months.

Mohammadi had admitted doing acts tending and intended to pervert the course of public justice.

His barrister, Helena Spectre, conceded: “He is the master of his own misfortune. He recognises that.”

Mohammadi, now of Boundary Road, East Ham, London, must complete 100 hours’ unpaid work.

Recorder Hawks also highlighted the fact that the conviction could impact on Mohammadi’s bid to extend his legal stay in the UK. “That’s your own fault, I’m afraid,” said the judge. “I hope this is the last time you will appear before a court.”

ends