By XAVIER SMERDON
THE Wyndham Highway Patrol has been hard at work, impounding eight cars in just 15 days.
Unit Commander of the Highway Patrol, Graeme Crouch, said drivers were literally handing their cars over to police with their irresponsible behaviour.
“Over the past few months we have had drivers handing their hard earned cash over after being detected doing the wrong thing, then it was their licence, and now we are experiencing an influx of drivers that are handing their cars over for impoundment,” Unit Com Crouch said.
While many of the impounds were the result of disqualified drivers being caught behind the wheel, some of them were much more serious.
On Saturday 24 August and 18-year-old Truganina man, who had only held his probationary licence for 40 days, was caught travelling at 127 kilometres in an 80 km zone.
He was also driving a manual car on an automatic licence.
On Friday 6 September a 21-year-old Wyndham Vale man with two female passengers passed a stationary police car, with its police lights flashing, on the Princes Freeway in Laverton at 137km in a 100km zone.
The Highway Patrol officer sitting in the car had finished his previous job and started to pursue the Wyndham Vale man.
“The driver was tracked during the catch up speed of an average speed between 150km to 180km as he travelled between Fitzgerald Rd and (the) Geelong Rd exit. He was finally stopped in Geelong Road Brooklyn, where he had his car impounded, with a release fee of $703,” Unit Com Crouch said.
“This speed, this driver’s age, (passing) the police car, two passengers in the car, really is one recipe for disaster.”
