By CAMERON LUCADOU-WELLS
A MAN ordered by a court to develop a road-safety campaign after nearly killing himself and four passengers in a drink-driving crash in Narre Warren South has been praised by his judge for doing a “pretty good job”.
Cadmiel ‘Tibby’ Duscas of Noble Park had been challenged in October by Dandenong Magistrate Greg Connellan – in lieu of a lengthy jail term – to use social media and visit schools to spread a road safety message to young people.
Duscas said that before reporting to Mr Connellan last Monday he had been worried that he had not done enough.
“The fact I could get locked up lingers at the back of my mind,” Duscas told the Journal. “I’ll just keep going with it.”
There were further nervous moments when Duscas missed a 10.40am callover in the court due to being bailed up by a TV crew outside.
Mr Connellan noted Duscas had since appeared on a TV current affairs program, had featured in “quite constructive” reports in the Journal and set up a road-safety Facebook page Our Second Chance – Almost Fatality to Reality.
Duscas is also planning to visit schools next year with some of the page’s 800 followers, including former road victims and people who “served time” for injuring or killing people on the road.
He said he wanted his school visits to have a point of difference. He told the court he would raise funds for activities, such as $500 vision goggles that could replicate impairment caused by a 0.10 blood-alcohol reading.
“We don’t want to just go in and preach,” Duscas told the Journal. “We want to make it fun.”
One of the potential campaign ‘recruits’ was an off-duty paramedic who revived Duscas at the crash at Pound Road early on 20 May 2012.
A Casey Highway Patrol officer who attended the crash was also willing to join the education tour.
“On the night, the crash looked so bad, he said to other police officers ‘be ready for five fatalities’,” Duscas told the Journal.
Many of the campaign’s growing list of contacts, including his former school Noble Park Secondary College, were enlisted after reading the Journal’s reports.
“It sounds like you’re doing a pretty good job,” Mr Connellan said.
“I’ve started,” Duscas replied. “The ball’s rolling.”
In October, Mr Connellan had banned Duscas from driving for four years and deferred further sentencing. This includes a possible jail term of more than 10 years – for driving under the influence and negligently causing serious injury to his four passengers.
Mr Connellan further deferred part of Duscas’s sentence in April, pending more information on Duscas’s school visits and Facebook campaign.
“I sense by this stage Mr Duscas will have been doing something worthwhile,” he said.
Duscas’s lawyer Michael Kuzilny said outside the court that Mr Connellan took a “holistic approach”.
“Rather than just being punished, the young offender is giving back to the community,” he said.
