A man has been sentenced to community service and probation after he drove twice while he was disqualified.

Stephen Rafferty claimed that he thought he had passed his test after a ban and that he thought he held a full driving licence.

The 47-year-old also has six previous convictions for driving while disqualified between 2004 and 2014.

High Bailiff Jayne Hughes ordered him to do 120 hours unpaid work and put him on probation for one year.

He was also banned from driving for a further 12 months with an order to take an extended test at the end of the ban.

We previously reported that police were performing speed checks at Governor’s Hill in Douglas on November 6 when they clocked Rafferty driving a BMW 5 Series at 51mph in the 30mph zone.

However, as police systems were down for maintenance, they could only perform limited document checks.

Rafferty, who lives at Central Promenade in Douglas, told officers that he had a full licence but had misplaced it, so he was given five days to produce it.

On November 12, he went to police headquarters and claimed that he had lost the document and asked if he could have an extension.

However, further enquiries then showed he only held a valid Manx provisional licence and had not retaken his test after a four-year driving ban in Wirral in 2014.

On December 17, police stopped Rafferty again while he was driving the BMW at Hillberry Corner in Onchan.

This time the vehicle was seized.

In court, he pleaded guilty to two counts of driving while disqualified and one count of speeding.

Defence advocate Peter Taylor said that up until 2014 his client had led a chaotic lifestyle.

The advocate said that Rafferty’s relationship had broken down, his ex-partner had thrown all his possessions away, and he had gone to prison.

Over the next four years, Mr Taylor said that Rafferty had then got his life back together.

The defendant said that he had obtained a provisional licence and taken lessons after his driving ban ended, and was convinced he had then passed his test in the UK.

Rafferty said he had then moved to the Isle of Man to be with a girlfriend, and had worked at the airport and in hotels.

Mr Taylor said that when Rafferty moved here he said he had sent his licence to the DVLA in order to get a Manx licence, and when it was returned to him, he had wrongly assumed it was a full licence, but it was only a provisional one.

‘He says he was very poor with paperwork and knows it was his responsibility to check,’ said the advocate.

‘He should have challenged it at the time. Having been to prison before for this type of offending he would never have risked it.

‘He accepts his attitude to paperwork has been very poor and this has now come back to bite him.

‘He had obtained insurance and was well outside the period of disqualification when he was driving.’

A probation report assessed Rafferty as a low risk of reoffending and of harm to others.

High Bailiff Mrs Hughes said that the fact that Rafferty had not offended since 2014 supported the submission that he had turned his life around.

He must also pay prosecution costs of £100, which he will pay at a rate of £10 per week.