Glinsk man gets suspended sentence for dangerous driving
A man whose girlfriend died, when he crashed his jeep while checking his phone for messages, has been given a suspended five-year sentence and disqualified from driving for ten years.
20 year old Alan Collins, from Clooncagh, Glinsk appeared for sentence before Galway Circuit Criminal Court.
Alan Collins had pleaded guilty in February to dangerous driving which caused the death of 19 year old Elaine Curley at Millford, Creggs on November 6, 2011.
The court heard the couple were neighbours and had been going out together for five years.
Neither of them were wearing seat belts when Collins lost control of his jeep as he tried to negotiate a bend a couple of hundred yards from a pub where the couple had been drinking since 6.30pm that evening.
He later admitted he had drank three pints in the pub and had been checking his mobile phone for missed calls or messages as he drove.