Fourteen years ago, Anthony Johnson was charged for refusing a breath test on the outskirts of Halls Creek.
It was his fourth offence in 24 years, and two Justices of the Peace fined him $2,000 and permanently disqualified him from holding a driver's licence.
"I couldn't do much without a licence," Mr Johnson said.
"I missed out on a lot of jobs and quite a few things.
Last week, Justice Marcus Solomon allowed an appeal against the 57-year-old Jaru man's disqualification and made a scathing indictment on how the justice system had dealt with his case.
"At one level, it is just a case about one person's loss of a driver's licence," Justice Solomon wrote.
"The state is surprisingly indifferent to the gulf between life on St Georges Terrace [main street in Perth] and the Canning Stock Route [in the Kimberley region]."
'Couldn't do much without licence'
For nearly 14 years, Mr Johnson walked 5km each way every day to get to his job as a youth worker in Halls Creek.
He waded through creek beds during the wet season and braved the brutal heat of the dry, and lost his brother to a medical episode as they were stuck kilometres from the local hospital.
"My brother had a heart attack," he said.
"We had to ring up the ambulance … it just took a while to get there.
The realities of living in remote Australia meant he has missed out on job opportunities and was unable to travel the 350km to the next town.
After a brief interlude where he took up a filmmaking course on the Gold Coast, Mr Johnson returned to Halls Creek to film a story about his mother and father's experiences living on the outback stations of the Kimberley.
Still, he was hamstrung when it came to venturing outside the small town.
Looking to see if he could get his disqualification lifted, Mr Johnson reached out.
"I went to the Legal Aid in Kununurra, and I thought I'd see if they could help," he said.
'Shouldn't have got disqualified'
Mr Johnson's Legal Aid lawyer Sarah King said she was struck by his case when it came across her desk.
"Mr Johnson came to our Legal Aid Kununurra office, and he was seeking some legal advice about having his lifetime driving licence disqualification removed," she said.
The service says Mr Johnson's disqualification should have been for two-and-a-half years at most, as Mr Johnson's driving offences were made over a two-decade period and he should not have been considered a "third-strike offender".
"It was pretty clear that having a lifetime disqualification for him was fairly significant," Ms King said.
"He lives remotely, and he lives about 5km from the nearest town.
"He also had some really [high] hopes with what to do with his driving licence when he could actually drive, and I was really keen to try to help put things right for him."
Ms King began trying to track down documents that had gone missing in the Halls Creek and Kununurra court systems and eventually lodged her appeal with the WA Supreme Court.
On hearing Ms King's case, Justice Solomon was particularly critical of the state prosecution's argument Mr Johnson had taken too long to bring his case to the court.
"The disadvantages that confront him are plain," Justice Solomon said.
"Given those circumstances, his reason for waiting 10 years is quite understandable.
Justice Solomon set Mr Johnson's conviction aside and sentenced him to a two-and-a-half-year disqualification, dating back to March 2008.
On winning the appeal, Ms King delivered the news to Mr Johnson.
"I was very relieved when the judgement was handed down," she said.
"[Anthony] simply said he was speechless, and thank you.
"That was very nice."
Mr Johnson said it was hard to believe the injustice he had faced.
"Does that mean for all these years, I [could have] had my licence?" he said.
"It made me angry because I lost out on a lot of opportunity and had a tragic loss because I didn't have [it]."
Mr Johnson said he would be going through local organisation Wunan to get his driver's licence back and study for his upcoming theory test.
When he hits the road again, Mr Johnson said his first priority was to start recording the story of his parents.
"I need to go out to the outback stations and do some filming," Mr Johnson said.
