Jason Byrne, film producer, pleads guilty after hitting person twice with Jeep in Richmond

A film producer mounted the kerb to cut in front of a queue of cars in Richmond before driving into a road worker, a court has heard.

. Image: Tracey Nearmy

A well known film producer has narrowly escaped jail time after hitting a person twice with his car in Richmond and fleeing from the scene.

Jason Byrne pleaded guilty at the Melbourne Magistrates Court on March 15, to a shocking road rage incident that happened in April 2019.

The 51-year-old has produced award-winning films and is widely known for his recent feature film Brothers’ Nest starring Shane Jacobson.

In a statement presented by police the court heard at about 12.48pm on April 4, Byrne had been driving on Dover St was stopped by a road safety worker controlling traffic around a construction site.

Mr Byrne was stopped at the back of a four-car line when he decided to mount the kerb to overtake the waiting cars.

Driving a black Jeep Grand Cherokee Byrne drove up next to the car at the front of the line.

The court heard the worker pointed the stop sign at him, and allowed the other cars to go through.

Byrne started revving his engine and yelled abuse at the worker.

Police said Byrne proceeded to ram the worker with his car, hitting his midsection and knees, before accelerating again and hitting the side of his body.

The court heard the victim yelled for the accused to stop, and moved out of the way in fear of being run over.

Byrne drove off down Dover St clipping a side mirror along the way.

One-hour later Byrne returned to the scene and spoke with the stop sign worker who told him the incident had been reported to the police.

Byrne was arrested in August 2019 and interviewed at the Richmond police station.

Magistrate Mia Stylianou told the court Byrne’s behaviour warranted jail time and said the road rage incident seemed out of character.

Ms Stylianou said Byrne was lucky that he was not being sentencing for reckless conduct endangering serious injury or for having caused injury to anyone.

She said she could not reconcile the person from the references, with the person described in the offending.

“Your behaviour is deserving of imprisonment,” she said.

“I am not going to impose a community correction order, I’m not going to send you to jail.”

The court heard he had been on his way to pick up his child from school when the incident happened.

In a statement taken by police, Mr Byrne said it was the traffic worker who had bumped into his car, not the other way around.

“He moved onto the road and waved all the other traffic through while holding me back,” Byrne told police.

“I moved onto the driveway to drive around him at normal speed, at less than 5 to 10km/h, he stook back, trying to stop me from travelling with the other traffic and bumped gently into my vehicle.”

Byrne pleaded guilty fail to render assistance after accident, fail to stop vehicle after an accident, drive in manner dangerous.

Mr Byrne has been ordered to pay a $4000 fine, has had his license cancelled and won’t be able to drive for 12 months.