A woman who faked her own death in a bid to avoid driving convictions has been jailed for eight months.
Zoe Bernard, 38, was already banned from the roads when she was arrested for driving carelessly and failing to stop in Kilburn, north London, in November 2020, Southwark Crown Court heard.
Posing as her sister Shanice in calls to police between December 15, 2020 and January 27 last year, she said ‘Zoe’ was ‘ill’ then ‘dead’, before applying for a death certificate to try to bolster her lie.
Judge Martin Beddoe jailed Bernard, from Kensington, west London, for eight months, of which she will serve half after she previously pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice.
‘This offence was clearly the result of some degree of thought and planning by you,’ the judge said on Wednesday.
‘I am quite satisfied this was an effort on your part to deceive the police. You already had a very bad record for driving matters and you knew full well the trouble you were in.
‘You set out to pervert the course of justice. You attempted to convince the police you were dying and had died. To reinforce that lie you tried to get hold of a death certificate.’
Zoe Bernard, 38, faked her own death in a bid to avoid driving convictions
The court heard that Bernard has a string of previous convictions and was jailed in October 2019 for drink-driving and driving while disqualified.
When stopped by police in November 2020, she gave her name as Kyesha Bernard, then during the investigation ‘Shanice’ called police claiming ‘Zoe’ had been ill and then died.
An online request was made for a death certificate but it was not issued because no death was on the register.
Prosecutor Gregor McKinley said: ‘It is our case the defendant was contacting police pretending to be her sister and making this application to the registration office.’
Bernard was prosecuted in the magistrates’ court in December last year and handed a six-month curfew after being found guilty of driving without insurance, failing to stop, driving while disqualified and careless driving.
Her barrister Margo Munro Kerr said her client has physical and mental health problems and has suffered a string of tragedies, including losing her uncle and eldest daughter in the Grenfell Tower fire.
‘These are the actions of a very unwell person in a way that is going to harm herself more than anyone else,’ she said.
She was already banned from the roads when she was arrested for driving carelessly and failing to stop in Kilburn, north London, in November 2020, Southwark Crown Court heard
‘This is such a strange way to act. It was so obvious the police would find out this was a lie. It was not rational.’
But Judge Beddoe said: ‘There is no reference to that in the psychological report. You told me before that her child had died in a car accident.’
‘I should not have spoken before taking full instructions,’ said Miss Munro Kerr.
She added that Bernard was a survivor of sexual violence from a police officer and was suffering from sickle cell disease, so any prison time would be extremely traumatic for her.
Bernard had requested the death certificate is because she was feeling suicidal and was making preparations, Miss Munro Kerr suggested.
‘This is a case where so many things have conspired to make it exceptional,’ she said. ‘A custodial sentence would have such a harmful impact on her that it would not be justified.’
‘How can you say that?’ Judge Beddoe replied. ‘Had she managed to get hold of the death certificate the police might have thought it was genuine.’
Sentencing, Judge Beddoe told Bernard: ‘You are someone that has very little respect for the operation for the law. I do not accept that this was as a result of any suicidal tendencies. This offence was clearly the result of some degree of planning by you.
‘From what I have read it is clear that you exaggerate events in your life in order to suit your interests.
‘Neither the psychiatric report nor the letter shown to me today has convinced me that justice should not take its proper course.
‘You have disregard for the law and you need to learn to do so.’
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10569723/Woman-38-faked-death-avoid-driving-convictions-jailed-eight-months.html
