Underage GAA club in Offaly gets €500 after speeding prosecution

BALLINAMERE/Durrow GAA will receive €500 as a result of a speeding prosecution in Clara.

Judge Andrew Cody ordered that €1,000 must be paid in total after a woman was prosecuted for speeding but her husband admitted he was the driver.

Jacqueline Larkin, Tullyshelferty, Dunraymond, Monaghan, Co Monaghan, was summonsed for exceeding the speed limit on the R436 road at Kilcoursey, Clara on December 9 last.

Ms Larkin's solicitor, Aisling Maloney, told Tullamore District Court that she was pleaded not guilty.

A GoSafe operator told that court that at 2.27pm on December 9 a vehicle was recorded driving at 61kph in a 50kph zone.

The court was presented with a picture of the vehicle.

When Ms Maloney put it to the witness that the individual pictured driving the vehicle could be a man, the reply was: “It could be a man”.

Sergeant Brendan Kearns said that a nomination of another driver was made by the registered owner but it was refused because it was outside the allowed time.

Paul Larkin, husband of Jacqueline Larkin, said in evidence that he was the driver of the car used on December 9 “all the time”.

It was registered to his wife but he was the driver in Clara and he said the man in the picture was him.

Mr Larkin said he was in Clara on business looking at sites that day and his wife was working in Cavan General Hospital.

Cross-examined by Sergeant Kearns, Mr Larkin said it had been an oversight that the nomination was out of time. He had no penalty points himself.

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Jacqueline Larkin gave evidence that she was working on the day of the alleged offence and produced evidence of a roster from the hospital's dialysis unit.

Ms Larkin said he husband said he would sort out the nomination but not long after the alleged speeding in Clara, in February 2025, his father had died.

When Sergeant Kearns put it to Ms Larkin that it was up to the registered owner to nominate another driver the woman said she had left it to her husband to sort out and though she then filled out the form and sent it, it was too late.

Ms Maloney applied for the prosecution of speeding against Ms Larkin to the struck out but Judge Cody said he would require €1,000 to be paid to the court poor box.

The matter was let stand for a period and when it was recalled Ms Maloney said that €500 was available and a week would be required for the balance.

Judge Cody said: “If he's scouting for sites to build houses he can give €1,000.”

He ordered that €500 be donated to Ballinamere/Durrow GAA and adjourned finalisation of the matter to this Wednesday, June 18 for the balance.

If that is paid the matter will be struck out, he indicated.