Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Driving Blind

I'm perfectly safe on the roads, says blind driver

A police officer described yesterday how he pulled over a motorist who was veering across the road and found that he had no eyes.

Omed Aziz, who lost both his eyes in a bomb blast and is also deaf, was caught behind the wheel with a friend sitting in the passenger seat giving him instructions on when to steer and brake, and how quickly to drive.

Aziz, who also suffers from leg tremors, claimed he was perfectly safe and denied a charge of dangerous driving before being convicted.

The Daily Telegraph 9/5/2006

The lawyer defending has to be given some credit for coming up with an argument in this case:

Timothy Gascoyne, defending, said Aziz, who did not give evidence, should be cleared because "the question is not whether his driving was dangerous, but whether being blind makes it dangerous".

He said: "If my client hadn't been blind he wouldn't have been arrested for dangerous driving, so it doesn't fall far below what is expected from a careful and competent driver."

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