reported a drunk driver but the gardai did nothing...

vibe666

bwardrop wrote: »

It is likely that none of them will wash with some people on here as there seems to be a little bit of Gardai bashing going on

sounds a lot like gardai sympathiserism (I'm sure there's a proper word for it) if you ask me.

anyway in all seriousness you weren't there.

it's a big enough car park that I've very rarely (if ever) seen totally full in all the time I've lived in the area.

I can't imagine that there were that many gardai busy picking up drunks at 8pm on a Thursday night.

brown-dog

I had a simialar experience in Dublin - I had called the gardai and followed the drunk driver to amke sure that it was the correct car they got. It was around the area I used to live in Sandyford and was coming up to traffic lights and I live on the corner and just pulled in to my driveway to call them again when the drunk driver actually turned around in the middle of the road, drove up behind my car in my house and started going mental saying I was following him ( he was off his face ) and then proceeded to kick a massive hole in the inside of my car door! I had called the gardai 4 times before they eventually arrived and I gave them his number plate, discription and everything but they said there is not alot they could do if they couldnt find him drunk behind the wheel and no evidence that he had put his foot through my car door!!!!!! There you go - they do there job most of the time but dont expect too much

vibe666

they seem to spend a lot of their time and effort as revenue collectors for the government but not much time on that other stuff. you know, crime and whatnot. :rolleyes:

Paparazzo

You can bet your balls if your name as Mr. Cowen or Mr. Ahern the cops would have got up off their fat lazy arses and done something

stink_fist

Maybe they were to busy attacking protesters?

TheBigLebowski

Maybe they recognised the description of the car and the reg as one of their colleagues and decided to turn a blind eye?

Fey!

Is drunk driver detection exclusively down to the Traffic Corps now, and do they operate 24/7.

If Navan is like Galway, then the Traffic Corps is based in a seperate part of the city (Liosban, soon to be Oranmore) to the main Garda station (Mill Street). Therefore, even if the Mill Street carpark is full, someone may have been sent out from Liosban.

TheNog

OP first fair play to ye for ringing it in. It is only when the drunk drivers realise that people can and will ring a garda station to report them will it get most of them to think again.

Secondly I am a Garda and am stationed within the Louth/Meath division, same as Navan. I can tell you it is a very busy station which is at the moment is under-resourced but it will be getting more members soon. They also have a large district to cover sometimes with only one car but usually 2 cars as the town and district is that busy. On the weekend nights the van is put on the road too. The 4-5 marked cars you saw are probably the Anvil cars which are based at Navan too but are not manned 24hrs.

On my travels I have reported suspected Drunk Drivers and most times they are caught and other times they are not. It is simply down to timing as the car could tied up at another job or they could be too far away to intercept. On one occasion, before I joined up, I saw a driver all over the road coming into Dunshaughlin and I phoned Ashbourne. They dispatched a Traffic car but they also must have called ahead to Navan at the same time because one patrol car appeared from behind me and one patrol car came from the Navan direction.

In my own station when we get a call from a motorist following a drunk driver we try our very best to intercept but sometimes we could be 15-20 minutes away and with any build up of traffic we could just as easily cause an accident even blues and sirens on. Remember we take a risk when travelling at speed, its a risk for us and for other road users too. Sometimes that risk is too high.

Arresting drunk driver is possibily the easiset charge a Garda can get. It takes roughly an hour to get breath samples on the breathilyser and charge them to the next court though Navan guards have to travel to either Trim or Kells to breathilyze one drunk driver.

To finish off, you did right and just because it didn't work out don't give up. Next time you see a drunk driver or any type of bad driving, report it 'cos you could save a life.

TheNog

OP quick question for you. Why didn't you post this in the Emergency Services Forum? We do get people asking us questions or concerns about our job which we are only too happy to answer.

TheNog

Fey! wrote: »

Is drunk driver detection exclusively down to the Traffic Corps now,

No any unit including traffic, regular unit or unmarked can arrest a drunk driver. The regular units also carry out traffic duties as well as all the other calls.

Fey! wrote: »

and do they operate 24/7.

Traffic don't operate 24hr but the regular do.

Fey! wrote: »

If Navan is like Galway, then the Traffic Corps is based in a seperate part of the city (Liosban, soon to be Oranmore) to the main Garda station (Mill Street). Therefore, even if the Mill Street carpark is full, someone may have been sent out from Liosban.

Traffic Corps that cover Navan district are based in Dunshaughlin now.

Dellboy2007

I think it's great that we have so many people who will go out of their way to put a stop to things like this. I wish i was more bothered or had less to do with my time.

vibe666

TheNog wrote: »

OP quick question for you. Why didn't you post this in the Emergency Services Forum? We do get people asking us questions or concerns about our job which we are only too happy to answer.

I didn't even realise there was one tbh, never even thought to look. boards.ie is a big place these days, it's easy enough to get lost.

thanks for your posts though, very well thought out and informative. and no I won't give up doing it. I just kept thinking what would happen if someone was hurt or killed as a result of this guy being on the road and it was no choice at all.

Actually as a Garda, I have a quick question for you which has been playing on my mind.

it occured to me when he stopped that I could just park up in front of the guy and open his door and remove his keys from the car and either throw them right into the bushes as far as possible or to just drop them back into the Navan garda station on my way back and tell them where he was.

WOuld that have been an acceptable thing to do? if they'd gone back to him would they be able to prosecute him for drink driving if he didn't have keys in the car at the time they catch him?

I'd also considered getting my g/f to video him in action on my phone which has got a 5MP camera in it so the quality would be plenty good enough to see what was going on.

I'm just thinking that if it happens again is there anything I could do differently?

TheNog

vibe666 wrote: »

I didn't even realise there was one tbh, never even thought to look. boards.ie is a big place these days, it's easy enough to get lost.

Emergency Services Forum can be found Soc - Emergency Services - Other Emerency Services.

You can ask questions of the Ambulance and Fire crews there too

vibe666 wrote: »

it occured to me when he stopped that I could just park up in front of the guy and open his door and remove his keys from the car and either throw them right into the bushes as far as possible or to just drop them back into the Navan garda station on my way back and tell them where he was.

WOuld that have been an acceptable thing to do? if they'd gone back to him would they be able to prosecute him for drink driving if he didn't have keys in the car at the time they catch him?

I'd also considered getting my g/f to video him in action on my phone which has got a 5MP camera in it so the quality would be plenty good enough to see what was going on.

I'm just thinking that if it happens again is there anything I could do differently?

Answer simply NO. Never in anyway put yourself in danger. Nine times out of ten it could work out but the one time you could put yourself at risk. In your actions you did everything right, you followed the driver and gave updates to the station. There was nothing more you could do.
If the driver was arrested for drunk driving without actually being caught driving by gardai, say if arrested when he was parked up, he could still be prosecuted for drunk in charge ( keys would have to be in the ignition) or drunk driving but not caught actually driving by Gardai, a statement from you and attendance in court would be required. Sometimes the driver would plead guilty before court appearance so you would be required in court. It is tricky enough prosecution to get but I have done it in the past. In all cases the driver would have to be arrested to determine the alcohol level.

Again fair play to ye and don't give up.

vibe666

thanks again TheNog, tis appreciated.

Raiser

biko wrote: »

Fair play OP for trying to do something about it.

+1

Those gobsh*tes should be ashamed to cash their paychecks - In my experience the Gardai are a miserable crowd of wasters - almost without exception.

vibe666

i would imagine it's like any other public service sector.

underfunded, understaffed, overmanaged and overworked.

Dellboy2007

vibe666 wrote: »

i would imagine it's like any other public service sector.

underfunded, understaffed, overmanaged and overworked.

Sure

TheNog

vibe666 wrote: »

they seem to spend a lot of their time and effort as revenue collectors for the government but not much time on that other stuff. you know, crime and whatnot. :rolleyes:

Actually most of my time is spent on crime such as visiting crime scenes, getting statements, public order, domestic violence, applying mental act, files and we must give traffic attention as well. Things like speeding, no tax, no insurance, no driving licence, dangerous/defective vehicles, stolen cars, dangerous driving, travelling criminals and drugs. In the same day we have summons to serves and warrants to execute too.
The last thing I am is a revenue collector but it is my job to enforce road safety. You did your part in enforcing road safety too.

Paparazzo wrote: »

You can bet your balls if your name as Mr. Cowen or Mr. Ahern the cops would have got up off their fat lazy arses and done something

TO me it doesn't matter who you are. All calls have to be prioritised ie emergency ones attended to first (serious traffic collisions, robbery, burglary in progress etc), least urgent calls are left last (burglary discovered, theft etc).

Dellboy2007 wrote: »

I think it's great that we have so many people who will go out of their way to put a stop to things like this. I wish i was more bothered or had less to do with my time.

Surely you could spare 5-10 minutes of your time and the price of a phone call to possibly save someone from serious injury or death?

Raiser wrote: »

+1

Those gobsh*tes should be ashamed to cash their paychecks - In my experience the Gardai are a miserable crowd of wasters - almost without exception.

*Ahem* Making a fairly generalised comment, don't you think? I have had days when I didn't have time for a break. Just last week myself and a colleague I arrested 4 fellas for theft at 9pm, we finished at 10pm but after interviewing, photographing and fingerprinting we finished up at 3am. Crashed at the station for 2 hrs and back to work at 6am. Happens from time to time.

vibe666

sorry for any offence TheNog, you obviously take your job very seriously but you have to admit there's a few bad apples in the bunch who are just in it for the money/status/power/chicks etc.

Kirby

TheNog wrote: »

Surely you could spare 5-10 minutes of your time and the price of a phone call to possibly save someone from serious injury or death?

To be fair thats not his job....its the gardai's job. The OP rang and rang and rang and nobody showed up. It wasnt his job but he did it as a concerned citizen.

Thats what the OP and several other people in this thread did and nothing ever came of it. Any body with an ounce of sense can realise that the gardai cant be everywhere at once. Its not an easy job but you guys choose to do it. And i respect that decision immensely. It cant be an easy occupation and you dont get paid enough for doing it right. Trouble is in my experience most of them dont do it right. A combination of poor policy makers and lazy officers.

Take my last 2encounters with the guards as an example. I spotted a guy trying to rob my neighbours house.....spotted him going in the back door. I rang the Gardai and they showed up in 10 minutes, asked me had happened and so on. Now, they didnt catch him but i was thrilled at the speed and competency of them. Great stuff!

But then another time there was a load of drunk eejits outside my house. They jumped over the gate, completely thrashed 2 of our cars, did some damage and left. This took about 30 minutes. I rang about 5 times. nobody showed up. Completely unacceptable.

I realise these are only a couple of first hand experiences but thats all the public have. And you cant just fob it off as " a few bad apples". Unfortunately, the type of people who gravitate towards police work are prone to lazyness and bigheadedness. Not to brand all with the same brush but it IS a problem. A guy i went to school with is now a Guard.....and if you knew the guy you would find that a disturbing prospect.

To get back on topic though, you mentioned something in your post about the priorities of the guardai and Your damn right. the priorities are wrong. 80% of road death happens on secondary and below roads.....and yet all the speed camera's and checkpoints are on motorways. Its disgracefull, and its pure money making. Motorways are safe as houses. Its dodgy country roads that are the problem. There is a Guard in my area who patrols the bus lane on a small patch of the N3 every morning. Surely there are more pressing tasks that he could see to? Yes, ii'm ranting slightly but Im just so annoyed at most of our public services at the moment.

TheNog wrote:

All calls have to be prioritised ie emergency ones attended to first (serious traffic collisions, robbery, burglary in progress etc), least urgent calls are left last (burglary discovered, theft etc).

The navan police station was packed according to the OP. Lets assume they werent just being lazy and had other work to do. Well, that work should've been dropped. What if the drunk driver had killed a child crossing the street? Thats more important than paper work.

Beta Ray Bill

I know this is off topic but I have never once had a good experience with a member of the Garda

TheNog: You are one in a million mate, I commend you for you efforts, if every Garda had your approach maybe we wouldn't have such a lawless country.

The Garda are generally Very Very Lazy and un-interested.

Do Garda get commission based on how many fines/arrests they make etc?

Scottie99

ninty9er wrote: »

Do you guys *know* the Gardaí did nothing, or are you working on the assumption that was the case because they didn't ring back.

I reported once and they rang back saying the reg didn't match the description of the car. Cartell.ie said otherwise.

Some Gardaí are workshy and some are just working off old info (i.e may have already been on the way towards the original sighting)

I was in contact with Ashbourne station, when it became apparent that the driver was heading to Navan, Ashbourne contacted Navan. When arriving in Navan I was expecting a squad car but to avail. So I contacted Navan and the Gardai seemed uninterested and claimed there was no one available. Now, considering Ashbourne had phoned 20 mins previous (fact) and feel quite an adequate amount of time for a car to be found. There is no "assumption!"

Oh and I did bump into squad car coming out of petrol station in Navan on N3 and they didn't seem to know what I was talking about.

Why bother trying to do you civic duty!

TheNog

vibe666 wrote: »

sorry for any offence TheNog, you obviously take your job very seriously but you have to admit there's a few bad apples in the bunch who are just in it for the money/status/power/chicks etc.

I do take my job and responsibility seriously but I'm no robocop at the same time. I find it always better to give people a chance rather than prosecute them for anything and everything. Its best to have people on your side than against.

Kirby wrote: »

To get back on topic though, you mentioned something in your post about the priorities of the guardai and Your damn right. the priorities are wrong. 80% of road death happens on secondary and below roads.....and yet all the speed camera's and checkpoints are on motorways. Its disgracefull, and its pure money making. Motorways are safe as houses. Its dodgy country roads that are the problem. There is a Guard in my area who patrols the bus lane on a small patch of the N3 every morning. Surely there are more pressing tasks that he could see to? Yes, ii'm ranting slightly but Im just so annoyed at most of our public services at the moment.

I have no idea who places the speed cameras where they are so I can't comment on that. Checkpoints on motorways are not there to catch speeders but rather those with no tax, insurance and travelling criminals. We all know most of fatalities occur on secondary and minor roads but honestly could you point out a place on most minor roads where a patrol car could be parked (facing onto the road for quick take-off) and have sufficient straight road for road users to see you and brake so as not to cause an accident? Some parts of secondary roads are good for checkpoints but we must work on the assumption of a vehicle coming around a bend at 70-80mph and then stop safely. It is all about safety of other road users and ourselves too. The last thing we went is to contribute to an accident due to improper positioning of a checkpoint.

Kirby wrote: »

The navan police station was packed according to the OP. Lets assume they werent just being lazy and had other work to do. Well, that work should've been dropped. What if the drunk driver had killed a child crossing the street? Thats more important than paper work.

As I have already said, Navan GS is used as a base for Operation Anvil so the cars are parked at the station. These cars are not used 24/7. For obvious reasons (this is a public domain) I'm not gonna say anymore on this.

You are right if paperwork was being done, it would have been dropped immediately to respond to this call. I have done it many times myself. One thing I will mention is that all calls where alcohol is involved the patrol car must be manned by 2 members. This has come about due to the potentially violent nature of some people when drunk.

grahambo wrote: »

TheNog: You are one in a million mate, I commend you for you efforts, if every Garda had your approach maybe we wouldn't have such a lawless country.

The Garda are generally Very Very Lazy and un-interested.

Do Garda get commission based on how many fines/arrests they make etc?

See this is where I think you are wrong. I am not one in million at all but I'm not gonna say either that there is no bad ones in the guards. The way the guardsare going these days is towards more accountability which will or hopfully should weed alot of the bad ones.
No we do not get commission nor do we have a quota to fill. We must however have a return of work such as charge sheets, summons, speeders etc. With regard to road safety quite frankly if we do not have a fatality or serious injury in my district then I'm happy. In the last year we had only one fatality that even we couldn't have predicted 'cos it was a cyclist, in a race, cycled straight into a parked truck. A few years ago County Meath had the worst fatality rate in the country but our safety rate has improved considerably even if that makes a few speeders unhappy with their fine and points, at least they got home safe and hopefully have learned to slow down.

Scottie99 wrote: »

Oh and I did bump into squad car coming out of petrol station in Navan on N3 and they didn't seem to know what I was talking about.

Why bother trying to do you civic duty!

But you are assuming that this car belonged to the Navan district. We sometimes go to Navan for fuel on nights, or the guards in the car could have been returning to their district from any of the prisons in Dublin, or the guard in the car could have been in Navan to use their cell or interview room for a prisoner. Tbh we will never be sure.

Bee

vibe666 wrote: »

picked up the missus last night after late night shopping in blanch and on the way home we noticed a car in front of us driving very erratically and quite dangerously after we passed through DunShaughlin.

we followed at a safe distance for a while, but it became very obvious from the way he was driving that there was something very wrong with him, he was weaving left and right over the middle line in the road and then right over on the hard shoulder too, speeding up then slowing down all the time and driving dangerously close to the car in front and oncoming traffic.

as we approached the Tara roadworks it became very obvious he was off his face either on drink or drugs (or both) so I got the g/f to call the Gardai in Navan so they could stop him. we gave a description of the car and the number plate and they promised to send someone right out.

there was still no sign of them when we got to the first few houses on the way into Navan so we called again with an updated position and they promised someone was on the way.

as we came towards the patrol station on the main road opposite the river a Garda car pulled out of the garage about 6 cars in front of us (before he would have been in a position to see the car and came towards us on the other side of the road.

i flashed my lights and waved at them pointing to the golf, assuming these were the people they had sent out, but from the look of them they didn't seem to be looking for anyone at all and totally blanked me and kept driving.

we decided to keep following him through Navan and see if the Garda turned round, but they didn't so we kept going and followed him. we stopped at one of the sets of lights and he tried to cut up a lorry and almost hit it. stopped behind him I could see his face in his rear view and wing mirrors and he was totally off his face twisted drunk/drugged.

we kept following him round expecting the cops to jump out at any minute, but they didn't.

as we went past woodies on the far side of town he obviously decided he'd had enough and pulled over to the side of the road, so we went past a few hundred yards and turned round once we were out of sight (not that he would have noticed anyway) and called the station again and told them that he had stopped and that they just had to send someone out to pick him up.

we waited to see what would happen, but after 10 minutes nobody had come and yer man decided to keep on driving.

having lost faith in the ability of the law to do it's job we decided we'd just go home and leave them to it. I took a slight detour past the Garda station figuring that maybe they were just low on resources, but to my surprise there were 5 marked cars and a transit and that every single car park space in the place was full.

I'm disappointed in myself that I didn't do more (I'd contemplated dragging him out of his motor and pasting him, but then I'd have been the bad guy and probably ended up in court), but I'm even more disappointed that the Gardai who's job it is to do this kind of thing got an almost guaranteed conviction handed to them on a plate and did nothing.

Oh for Gawd's sake they promptly sent a car to run a speed check by hiding underneath the bridge on the Stillorgan dual carraigeway to catch motorists breaking the limit by 1kmh!

Bee

Scottie99 wrote: »

I was in contact with Ashbourne station, when it became apparent that the driver was heading to Navan, Ashbourne contacted Navan. When arriving in Navan I was expecting a squad car but to avail. So I contacted Navan and the Gardai seemed uninterested and claimed there was no one available. Now, considering Ashbourne had phoned 20 mins previous (fact) and feel quite an adequate amount of time for a car to be found. There is no "assumption!"

Oh and I did bump into squad car coming out of petrol station in Navan on N3 and they didn't seem to know what I was talking about.

Why bother trying to do you civic duty!

Apart from the usual unprofessionalism that we have come to expect from the Gardai it highlights how there must be much more of a public input and control of how the Gardai are operated.

For too long they have run themselves as if they are a private club rather than public servants.

They must reform now and accept accountibility and take instruction directly from the public

Kirby

TheNog wrote: »

The way the guardsare going these days is towards more accountability which will or hopfully should weed alot of the bad ones.

If this is true, then its a good thing. If a patient dies under a doctors care then hes held accountable so the same should apply to other life saving services like the guards.

Fair played to you btw for coming on here and discussing issues like this. You've more balls than most.

Scottie99

TheNog wrote: »

But you are assuming that this car belonged to the Navan district. We sometimes go to Navan for fuel on nights, or the guards in the car could have been returning to their district from any of the prisons in Dublin, or the guard in the car could have been in Navan to use their cell or interview room for a prisoner. Tbh we will never be sure.

Its an available car!

TheNog

Scottie99 wrote: »

Its an available car!

True but what I'm saying is that if the car you saw was from another district it may not have even been on the same radio channel that Navan uses. So the guards in the car would not have known assistance was sought and Navan would not have known that car was even there.

TheNog

Bee wrote: »

They must reform now and accept accountibility and take instruction directly from the public

Reform and be accountable is on the way, in fact accountability is the being used more and more within the guards. Of course it will take time but hopefully we will get there.

Taking instruction from the public? Not sure what you mean by this. Public calling for reform = yes, having someone approach me on a Saturday night instructing me to take them home = absolutely not

Kirby wrote: »

If this is true, then its a good thing. If a patient dies under a doctors care then hes held accountable so the same should apply to other life saving services like the guards.

Fair played to you btw for coming on here and discussing issues like this. You've more balls than most.

Maybe its my arguementative side or maybe I am tired of people complaining about us and not getting our side of the story. For too long the AGS has been too secretive about what we do and while alot of my job does require confidentiality some of it does not. That's why I am all in favour of a TV show similar to Road Wars or Street Wars or better still a combination of both. Tbh it would probably show us up with a p**s poor equipment and resources.

Maybe a sticky could be created by a garda for people on the Motors forum to discuss problems we have with motorists and the forum users have with us. Not a garda bashing thread but where only genuine questions and myths could be put to rest.