Illawarra mechanic Joseph Saffioti sentenced for approving pink slips for unsafe cars

A dodgy mechanic ticked off dozens of pinks slips without running the vehicles through the proper checks, with a court hearing he approved a Toyota LandCruiser so faulty it could not even be driven from the site.

Joseph Saffioti leaving Wollongong Local Court on Thursday. Picture: Dylan Arvela

A dodgy mechanic ticked off dozens of pinks slips without running the vehicles through the proper checks, with a court hearing he approved a Toyota LandCruiser so faulty it could not even be driven from the site.

Former Gateway Automotive employee Joseph Saffioti was sentenced in Wollongong Local Court on Monday after pleading guilty to four counts of knowingly producing a false or misleading documents and four counts of breaching a condition of an examiner’s authority.

The 33-year-old’s offending spanned 12 days in March when the Haywards Bay man passed safety inspections for 53 cars which Magistrate Claire Girotto said, in some instances, he had not even laid eyes on.

The court heard the two most serious examples involved a Lexus and the LandCruiser which both had “major grounding defects” with the latter so unsafe it was not even able to be driven from the Fairy Meadow site.

“To tick off a car when the tyre is slightly bald is one thing,” Ms Girotto said.

Joseph Saffioti worked at Gateway Automotive in Fairy Meadow. Picture: Google Maps

“To tick off a car as safe when it’s not and he hasn’t even looked at it is another.”

While emphasising the need for proper checks to be conducted, Ms Girotto pointed to a “big case” in 2018 where a truck lost its brakes and ploughed through McDonald’s Fairy Meadow, which coincidentally is across the road from where Saffioti was employed.

Three people were taken to hospital as a result of the incident with a report released two years afterwards indicating the truck had defects including faulty brakes.

The truck which crashed through the McDonald’s Fairy Meadow carpark on November 5, 2018.

The offender’s lawyer Cameron Meaney told the court the conduct occurred during a “difficult time” where he was “experiencing bullying at his workplace” and he “just wanted to get out of the situation he was in”.

Joseph Saffioti sentenced to a six-month intensive correction order. Picture: Facebook

Mr Meaney said the conduct was not for financial gain, adding Saffioti was no longer in the industry and was now working as a diesel fitter.

During sentencing Saffioti said to Ms Girotto he did not “want to go back to the motor vehicle industry again”.

Saffioti wrote a letter to the court stating he “wanted to apologise to anyone affected by my decisions”.

Ms Girotto handed Saffioti a six-month intensive correction order which will expire on April 30, 2025.

“If he had fraud on his record he would be going into custody,” she said to Mr Meaney.

Saffioti was also fined a combined sum of $3500 and ordered to continue seeing a psychiatrist.

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