Oakleigh bus driver Georgios Koukoulis wins appeal over excessive licence suspension

He hit and killed a man when he was working as a bus driver. He was jailed, received a community corrections order. But a court has rule the licence suspension he copped was too long.

Georgios Koukoulis will be able to apply for his licence this year.

An Oakleigh man was slapped with “excessive” driving restrictions after he hit and killed a pedestrian when he was working as a bus driver, the Court of Appeal has ruled.

Georgios Koukoulis will be back on the roads 18 months earlier than first expected, having had his sentence revised at the Supreme Court.

The former bus driver was jailed for 12 months, copped a two-year community correction order and was disqualified from driving for three years in the County Court in May 2019.

He will be able to apply to drive later this year.

The ruling came after he pleaded guilty to one charge of dangerous driving causing death, having hit and killed a man on a pedestrian crossing Beach Rd in Mordialloc in September 2017 due to inattention.

But on February 14, Justices Simon Whelan and Phillip Priest agreed the decision to disqualify his licence for three years was “erroneously excessive”.

“It does not seem to me that a period of disqualification was needed to protect the community from the applicant’s driving,” Justice Whelan said.

He said he thought the jail sentence and community correction order had sufficiently punished Koukoulis.

He noted the sentencing judge had not given a reason for choosing the “extensive period of disqualification”, saying Koukoulis had an otherwise unblemished driving record.

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The justices ordered that he instead serve the minimum disqualification period required by law, 18 months, meaning he will be able to apply to drive again from November.

The court heard Koukoulis had continued to drive in the 18 months between the accident and his trial, but had stopped working as a bus driver, having started a new career at a shop fitting business.

He was driving a bus down Centreway in Mordialloc in September 2017 when the fatality occurred.

The court heard he turned right into Beach Rd while distracted by a document and a Myki machine, hitting a man who was crossing with the green man.

It was ruled “the sole cause of the accident was (Koukoulis’) failure to keep a proper lookout”.