Mansfield driver knocked over a woman in care home car park during police chase

Sigits Ceburs' silver Renault Espace was flagged by an ANPR camera in Ollerton at 6pm on July 12 last year, prosecutor Almas Ben-Aribia said.

After he was boxed-in by two police cars outside a garage on Clipstone Road West, Forest Town, Ceburs accelerated, shunting a police car out of the way and causing more than £6,000 of damage.

He drove off along the pavement before turning left into the grounds of Red Oaks care home, where he collided with a woman.

Ceburs continued driving into a dead end where a police car rammed the Espace as his passenger got out.

Ceburs climbed over a fence into a neighbouring garden and was caught with the help of police dogs.

The woman, who was there to collect the remains of her father from the home, was hit on the right hip, and her pelvis was fractured.

She declined to be admitted to hospital and her injuries were expected to heal without the need for medical intervention, Ms Ben-Aribia said.

The Renault was fitted with number plates cloned from a vehicle in Essex, Nottingham Crown Court heard on October 28, and Ceburs borrowed the car from a friend, with no insurance.

Bianca Brasoveanu, mitigating, said Ceburs, of previous good character, was left "depressed and anxious" as a result of the incident, and resorted to alcohol, before checking into a rehabilitation unit in his native Latvia.

Ceburs was a "hardworking family man" who worked in the motor trade and was under financial pressure at the time, said Ms Brasoveanu, and “he found a system not to pay taxes on the vehicle he was driving.”

Ceburs, 38, of Recreation Street, Mansfield, pleaded guilty to dangerous driving, fraudulent number plates, and driving without a licence or insurance, on January 3.

Judge Gregory Dickinson QC told him: "You put yourself first, you drove away from the police without regard to the safety of anyone."

He sentenced him to eight months in prison, and banned him from driving for 16 months.

He must take an extended driving test before he gets behind the wheel again.

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