Banned driver who used fake number plates is jailed for 15 months

The innocent owner of the identical motorcycle ended up receiving penalty notices for speeding and bus lane violations, Leicester Crown Court was told.
Hammad Sakhi, 25, the son of a Leicester solicitor, eventually crashed his motorbike on a city road – and fled leaving it behind. He then falsely reported to the police that his Kawasaki had earlier been stolen, Leicester Crown Court was told.
Sakhi, of Stoughton Drive South, Oadby, was jailed for 15 months. He pleaded guilty to two counts of perverting the course of justice, by using false number plates on his own vehicle, between September 14 and October 23, and making a false theft report, on October 25.
Gary Short, prosecuting, said that Sakhi was banned from driving for four years in December 2011, for driving with excess alcohol. He bought a Kawasaki bike last September and began using it having acquired false plates with the same number as an identical bike he saw advertised for sale.
Sakhi was known to have driven it illegally along bus lanes on 11 occasions, was clocked by an automatic number plate recognition camera and also went through a speed trap, days before he was in an road accident, on October 23.
The owner of the identical bike lived in the West Midlands and contacted his local police when he began receiving penalty notices for traffic violations he was alleged to have committed in Leicester – when he had not even been in the city.
When falsely reporting his bike as stolen the defendant claimed the gate at home had been damaged, where the motorbike was kept.
When the police asked Sakhi what his registration number was he said he could not remember it.
The defendant had obtained the false plates to enable him to drive whilst disqualified, on a bike that he legitimately owned, the court was told.
Sentencing, Judge Nicholas Dean QC said: “You have an appalling record mainly involving driving and ignoring sentences involving disqualification from driving. From 2011 there was a period where you appeared to have got your life back on track, avoided further driving offences and complied with the disqualification imposed in December 2011, until such time you applied for the disqualification to be reduced – and you succeeded in one instance but failed in getting another disqualification reduced.
“You chose to buy a motorbike and disguised it so you could drive, you hoped, without being detected. It was inevitable you’d be caught. You’re now paying a heavy price for that behaviour.”