Darwen man perverted course of justice by lying about army

Dominic Cain, 32, was seen by police driving a Ford Transit van along Blackburn Road heading in the direction of Accrington in the early hours of July 4 2021.

Preston Crown Court heard that the van caught the attention of police when it took a sharp turn into Willows Lane.

Prosecuting, David Clarke, said: “The police followed the van and carried out a quick check, discovering the van belonged to a scaffold company.

“Thinking it was a strange time for the van to be out, it was 2.50am, the police signalled for it to stop.

“However, the van did not stop and continued on.”

Dominic Cain (Image: Lancs Police)

What followed was a three-minute chase, at normal speed, however, Mr Clarke said the pursuit was particularly dangerous as Cain, who was driving, travelled down 20mph streets at 30mph where cars were parked either side of the road, went over speed bumps without slowing down, and failed to stop at give way signs.

He went on: “The van had turned off its lights by this time and then went down a back alley, before travelling down a track filled with potholes at 30mph, which was barely wide enough to fit one car.

“The defendant nearly lost control at one point and eventually did, crashing into a hedgerow.”

Cain and a passenger then exited the vehicle and tried to run from police, but an officer caught up with him.

He denied being the driver and also refused to blow into a breathalyser after the officer said he could smell alcohol on his breath.

He was arrested and taken to the police station where he did finally provide a sample, and blew a reading of 80, with the legal drink drive limit being 35. Cain was also found in possession of a small bag of cocaine.

Cain continued to deny the offences but eventually pleaded guilty before trial, and during an interview with probation to compile a pre-sentence report, the 32-year-old told officers he had served 10 years in the army and had completed two tours of Afghanistan and had also been diagnosed with PTSD.

Mr Clarke told the court that this simply wasn’t true, with Cain’s own father even writing to judges in May last year to tell them that any claims of such nature were completely false.

The court heard that despite Cain being employed by the army, twice over the course of a 10-year period, he had only ever been deployed overseas once, to Cyprus, where he spent 10 days before being sent back to the UK for medical reasons.

He had never served in Afghanistan and had never had an official PTSD diagnosis.

Cain was charged with perverting the course of justice but denied this until March this year.

He has 10 convictions for 24 offences.

Defending, Kevin Batch said his client was the sole bread winner for his family, had two children and was a hard worker and wanted to apologise to the court and to those in the armed forces who had served in the field.

He said: “It was a stupid and shameful thing to do, to say he had served in Afghanistan, and since he made those comments he has regretted it every day.”

Sentencing, District Judge Richard Clews said: “The situation you find yourself in is unfortunate as it didn’t have to be this way and has been created by your own actions.

“If you had stopped for the police you would have faced only drink drive, possession of cocaine and no insurance charges and it’s more than possible you wouldn’t have gone to prison.

“But you chose to drive away. You crashed into a hedge. You should have come to your senses and given yourself up, but you ran off and persisted in a false account of what happened.

“Then, having pleaded guilty you got it into your head to give a false account to the probation service of your time in the army.

“This went on for 10 months before you admitted what you had done – I can only assume your comments were an attempt to get the court to look more favourably upon you and an attempt to get a lesser sentence.

“This was an elaborate deception.”

Cain, of Highfield Mews in Darwen, pleaded guilty to drink driving, dangerous driving, driving with no insurance, possession of cocaine and perverting the course of justice.

He was jailed for 12 months and banned from driving for three and a half years when he will be required to sit an extended re-test to get his licence back.