A driver who caused the death of three friends in a horror crash when he was a teenager has escaped a road ban after he admitted to crashing his car into a roundabout.
Robbie Gemmell was just 16 when he jumped into the driver’s seat of pal Jenna Barbour’s Peugeot 206 and careered down a remote country lane in East Lothian in November 2013.
Gemmell lost control of the vehicle and ploughed head-on into a brick wall resulting in the deaths of school pals Jenna, 18, Joshua Stewart, 16, and 15-year-old David Armstrong.
READ MORE - Meghan and Harry slam 'small' cottage they were forced to live in on palace grounds
Gemmell initially told police he had been a front seat passenger and tragic Jenna had been driving when the car crashed near the hamlet of Tyninghame.
But a police investigation proved Gemmell had been behind the wheel and the teenager eventually broke down and confessed his guilt as he lay in hospital recovering from his injuries.
Gemmell, now 25, has appeared back in the dock at Edinburgh Sheriff Court to plead guilty to an amended charge of careless driving where he crashed his car into a roundabout just three miles from where his friends lost their lives in 2013.
Sheriff Wendy Sheehan sentenced Gemmell, from Dunbar, East Lothian, to pay a fine of £640 and placed eight penalty points on his licence during Wednesday’s hearing.
Gemmell pled guilty to driving a vehicle without due care and attention by driving at excessive speed, losing control of his vehicle and causing it to collide with a roundabout and overturn causing damage to his vehicle and injury to himself at Thistly Cross Roundabout, near Dunbar, East Lothian, on April 16 last year.
The Crown accepted a not guilty plea to Gemmell failing to comply with a breath test at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary on the same date.
In 2014, Gemmell was sentenced to a four year driving ban and ordered to carry out 300 hours unpaid work after he had pleaded guilty to a charge of causing the death of his three school pals by driving without due care and attention.
READ NEXT:
Tributes flood in for 100-year-old Edinburgh Hibs fan and Niddrie legend after death
Plush Edinburgh hotel apologises after American tourist 'scolded' by staff
Edinburgh Airport to scrap 100ml liquid rules under major new travel changes
Woman's body found on East Lothian beach as police race to scene
Snow predicted to fall in Edinburgh on Christmas Day as first forecasts emerge
