Drink-driving victim 'will need 24-hour care for rest of her life'

A drink driver broke a red light and smashed into another car leaving a Zimbabwean refugee needing 24-hour supervision for the rest of her life, Dublin Circuit Criminal Court has heard.

Faye Sherlock, a single mother, was more than three times the legal limit when she crashed into the car causing Yvonne Nutuhle to be flung out the rear side window and end up 26 feet away on the opposite side of a dual carriageway at Blackrock in August 2002.

The 23-year-old, who was an asylum seeker at the time but has since been granted refugee status, remains in hospital to this day after suffering severe brain injuries in the accident. According to medical reports she will require 24-hour supervision for the rest of her life.

Sherlock (aged 24), originally from Highland Grove, The Park, Cabinteely, but now living in Bray, pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing serious bodily harm to Ms Nutuhle and drunk driving on August 31, 2002.

Judge Michael White said because of the "very grave circumstances" surrounding the incident he needed some time to reflect on the matter. He adjourned sentence until July 16 and remanded Sherlock on continuing bail.

Sergeant John Burke told Mr Colm O’Briain BL, prosecuting, that some witnesses described Sherlock’s Daihatsu Charade driving erratically along Carysfort Avenue at 2 am just before the accident at the junction of Frascati Road after she had left a pub in Dalkey.

As she approached the lights, which witnesses claimed were red, she kept driving and crashed straight into the Fiat Cinquento, containing Ms Nutuhle and two Nigerian friends. Investigators also discovered that Sherlock would have been driving over the 30 mph speed limit at the time.

Ms Nutuhle spent some weeks in St Vincent’s Hospital before being moved to Beaumont. She was later transferred to the National Rehabilitation Hospital before returning to St Vincent’s and was currently a patient in St Luke’s Hospital.

Doctors have reported that she has a limited understanding of her difficulties and it is hoped that she will one day be able to walk with the assistance of just one person. She would need 24-hour supervision for the rest of her life.

Sgt Burke agreed with Mr Adrian Mannering SC, for Sherlock, that she was the victim of a sexual assault by a very close friend three months before the accident. She had not told any of her friends but on the night a friend of the offender had joined their group in the pub and told everybody about the incident.

Sherlock had planned to stay in a friend’s house that night and not drive but she stormed out to her car after this incident in the pub took place.

Gda Derek Maguire told the court that the person involved in the sexual assault had since pleaded guilty to that offence in the District Court and was given the Probation Act and ordered to pay €1600 euro in compensation.

Mr Mannering told the court that after the incident in the pub Sherlock " just snapped" and drove when she was in no fit state to do so. She had a seven-year-old son who was emotionally disturbed and if she was jailed he would be put into foster care.

He said: "There is another life involved in this wretched case. The court must take into account that this will be a consequential hardship."

Sherlock had written a letter to the Nutuhle family to express her total remorse at what had occurred and said it would be with her for the rest of her life.

Mr Mannering concluded: "The act is inexcusable but no useful social purpose is served by incarcerating this woman."