Road rage driver filmed screaming at motorist faces jail time

A driver who was filmed screaming abuse at a woman after she beeped at him is facing jail.

Peter Abbott got out of his car and approached frightened Samantha Isaacs’ vehicle following the minor incident outside a Tesco petrol station.

Mrs Isaacs locked her doors and began filming 60-year-old Abbott beating on her windscreen with his fists before unleashing a foul-mouthed tirade.

He shouted at her ‘can you f**king see me you f**king tart?’ then called her a ‘slag’ and a ‘whore’ and put his head up against the windscreen.

A male motorist went to intervene and called Abbott a bully, telling him ‘What is wrong with you, it’s a woman on her own!’

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To which Abbott replied ‘she’s a f**king bloody annoying woman’.

The footage was shown at Poole Magistrates’ Court in Dorset where Abbott went on trial for using threatening words or behaviour to cause alarm, distress or fear of violence.

He denied the offence, saying ‘it’s not against the law to be angry’ but was found guilty of the offence.

Sentencing was adjourned for reports but a district judge warned Abbott that he may go to jail it was the ‘most serious”‘ of this type of offence.

Afterwards Mrs Isaacs, who is aged in her late 50s, said: “He’s a horrible man and a bully. I didn’t want it to go this far, I just don’t want him to do it to anyone else.”

The road rage incident happened on August 25 last year when Mrs Isaacs was leaving the petrol station at Tesco Extra in Bournemouth, Dorset, just before lunchtime.

Abbott, who had been shopping in the main store, pulled out in front of her causing her to slam on her brakes.

The mother of three had honked her horn, prompting Abbott to make rude gestures at her before stopping his car and getting out.

Mrs Isaacs told the court: ‘I had just pulled out and a car came out of the shopping area and completely cut me up to the point where I had to slam on my brakes so hard all my belongings came off the passenger seat onto the floor.

‘I beeped my horn as if to say “look out” type of thing. He turned round in the car and started gesticulating, then he got out of the car and started shouting at me.

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‘He said what did I think I was doing and started hitting my car and calling me a lot of names like f**king slag and whore. He was banging with both his fists on the windscreen and my door. I was frightened so I started videoing it.’

She added: ‘I didn’t think he was going to kill me or anything but this was escalating and I wanted to have it on camera. I felt unsafe. I would have thought after it being such a long time ago I would be okay, but it’s still not very nice to watch (the video).’

After the initial encounter, Abbott followed her briefly, causing Mrs Isaacs to call the police.

District judge Orla Austin asked Mrs Isaacs what the long-term impact had been. She said: ‘Whenever I am in the car on my own I always keep the doors locked, I have made sure my dashcam works.’

The court heard Abbott was identified as the registered keeper of the Toyota involved in the road rage and was interviewed by police in October.

He claimed he was in fact the victim of road rage as Mrs Isaacs had sounded her horn several times, flashed her lights at him and made a rude gesture.

He told the court: ‘The origin of this incident was the behaviour of the witness. Despite what she has said on oath in this court, she didn’t just sound her horn once, she sounded it several times and flashed her lights, which I deem road rage.

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‘I believed there was enough space so I pulled out. I looked at her in my rear view mirror, she was flashing her lights and sounding her horn and making a rude gesture at me.

‘I do not like people filming other people without their permission, I think it’s a violation of their privacy. The reason why the incident didn’t just stop there is that I didn’t see any distress whatsoever, what I saw was her laughing at me and filming me after I asked her to stop.

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‘It was not a nervous laugh, it was a goading laugh. I regret my behaviour but there’s a number of statements I contest.”

Judge Orla Austin said she found Mrs Isaacs an ‘entirely credible witness’ and found Abbott guilty.

She said: ‘It is very clear to me from the footage that he was banging on her car. The level of anger was extremely high. I don’t believe you, I find you did all those things and were entirely threatening. The anger was out of all proportion to the incident.’

She warned Abbott, of Bournemouth, that he faces imprisonment as the incident was the ‘most serious’ of this type of offence.

Sentencing was adjourned until later this month for probation to assess Abbott.

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