Team 11 football head Ghadir Razuki banned for backbreaking accident
Team 11 chairman Ghadir Razuki fiddled with radio before causing a smash that broke 91-year-old’s back.
South East
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THE man driving the challenge to bring soccer to the southeast suburbs caused a catastrophic chain reaction car crash which left a 91-year-old woman with a broken back.
At Frankston Magistrates’ Court yesterday, interim Team 11 chairman and multi-millionaire publishing guru Ghadir Razuki pleaded guilty to one charge of careless driving.
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Team 11 is the franchise pitching to become the A-League’s 11th team, with promises to build a $170 million, 15,000 seater stadium in Dandenong if they kick on.
The court heard at 5pm on January 14 this year Razuki was towing a trailer full of furniture along Peninsula Link at Moorooduc.
The 59-year-old momentarily glanced down to change the controls on his touchscreen radio, but by the time he looked back up traffic had slowed to a near standstill.
His vehicle then smashed hard, at a speed estimated to be between 80 and 100km/h, into the back of a car which then caused a concertina crash involving two more vehicles.
A 91-year-old female passenger and her son-in-law driver both had to be taken to Frankston Hospital by ambulance with vertebrae, rib and head laceration injuries.
Three more people in the front two vehicles suffered muscle soreness in the accident.
His lawyer told the court said Razuki had helped out at the scene where he could, was genuinely shocked by his actions, and was remorseful.
He said he needed his licence to get from the city to his Rosebud farm a few times a week, and also to travel to meetings to discuss soccer issues.
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But magistrate Rodney Crisp said his careless driving caused a great deal of harm and letting him keep his licence would be a “moral neglect”.
“You have to suffer a penalty for their suffering,” Mr Crisp said.
“It was a really bad transgression … (there is) a fair old spread of misery as a result of this.”
Razuki was convicted and fined $2000, and disqualified from driving for 18 months.
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