Price of ‘scrapped’ car trebled while mileage plummeted

A man who sold a car for scrap for €500 has since spotted it for sale for €1,500, with 300,000 fewer kilometres on the clock.

The man also received M50 tolls, and a speeding fine, for the car, which was no longer supposed to be on the road.

The case was heard before a district court in Co Cork, recently, ahead of a TV programme, this week, which indicated that potentially unsafe vehicles are on Irish roads, including some brought in from overseas.

In the case, heard in Bandon District Court this month, the previous owner of the vehicle, Timothy O’Driscoll, of Drimoleague, in Co Cork, said he had responded to an advertisement in the local, Southern Star newspaper, for cars wanted for scrap.

He said there were 512,000km on the clock, when he sold the vehicle on November 3 last.

“It was sold for scrap,” he said. “The [vehicle registration] book was inside in the vehicle. I rang the man [he sold it to] about it to send it back and he refused.

“I assumed it was scrapped.”

However, Mr O’Driscoll was notified by eFlow that the vehicle had passed tolls on the M50 on November 19 and November 20, and he was later notified about a speeding violation near Enniskeane, in Co Cork, on November 11, when the vehicle was clocked driving at 74kmph in a 60kmph zone.

He said he informed eFlow that the car was no longer his and he also contacted the vehicle-registration unit in Shannon, in Co Clare.

The court heard that Mr O’Driscoll’s partner noticed the vehicle advertised for sale last February, in Dublin, for €1,500 and with considerably less mileage on the clock.

Judge James McNulty said: “In the blink of an eye, it has dropped 300,000km,” adding that this was a “deep clean”.

The charges against Mr O’Driscoll were dismissed after the court accepted that he was no longer the owner of the car, once it had left his possession on November 3.

A report aired this week by RTÉ’s Investigations Unit claimed that cars no longer roadworthy in other countries were ending up in Ireland, due to a lack of legislation.

The report said many of the vehicles — known as ‘Category B’ write-offs — were imported from the UK, but also from as far away as Australia.