Peter Abbott smashed his fists into her windscreen before unleashing a foul-mouthed tirade at scared Samantha Isaacs after cutting her up in a Tesco car park
A terrifying road rage drive who smashed his fists into a woman’s windscreen and shouted abuse at her after cutting her up has been ordered to take anger management classes.
Peter Abbott approached Samantha Isaacs’ frightened car after the minor incident outside a Tesco petrol station. The 60-year-old pounded his fists on the windscreen before unleashing a foul-mouthed tirade. Ms Isaacs, who runs a TV production company and has worked with Prince William and Alan Titchmarsh, locked her doors and began filming the irate Abbott.
He shouted at her, “Can you fucking see me, you fucking idiot?” He then called her a ‘s**g’ and a ‘whore’ and put his head against the windshield. A male motorist tried to intervene and called Abbott a bully. The Good Samaritan said to him: “What’s wrong with you, she’s a woman on her own”, to which Abbott replied: “She’s a bloody nasty woman”.
The footage was shown earlier this month at Poole Magistrates’ Court in Dorset, where Abbott stood trial for using threatening words or behavior to cause alarm, distress or fear of violence. He denied the offence, saying “It’s not against the law to be angry”, but was found guilty. Today he was ordered to take an anger management course.
He was also given a 12-week prison sentence, suspended for 18 months. Abbott was also banned from driving for 18 months and ordered to pay £300 court costs.
District Judge Orla Austin ordered Abbott to attend an anger management program called Creating Positive Connections and pay Ms Isaacs £300 in compensation.
She said: ‘I believe this was an extremely serious matter. Ms Isaacs was a lone woman in her car, it was an ongoing incident, your level of anger and aggression was extremely high and your language was extremely offensive.
“You put her in great fear and it has had an ongoing effect on her life and on the bystanders who intervened.”
Sentencing had been stayed due to reports, but a district judge warned Abbott he might go to jail because his offense was the “most serious”. Afterwards, Mrs Isaacs, in her late 50s, said: “He’s a terrible man and a bully. I didn’t want it to get to this point, I just don’t want him to do it to anyone else.”
The road rage incident happened on August 25 last year when Ms Isaacs left the Tesco Extra petrol station in Bournemouth, Dorset, just before lunchtime. Abbott, who was shopping in the main store, drove in front of her, causing her to slam on the brakes. The mother-of-three honked, prompting Abbott to make rude gestures at her before stopping his Toyota car and getting out.
Ms Isaacs told the court: “I had just left and a car came from the shopping area and completely cut me open to the point where I had to slam on the brakes so hard that all my stuff fell from the passenger seat onto the floor . I beeped my horn as if to say ‘watch out’.
“He turned around in the car and started gesticulating, then he got out of the car and started shouting at me. He said what I thought I was doing and started hitting my car and calling me names a lot, like f*** He banged on the windshield and my door with both fists. I was scared, so I started filming it. I wanted to show him that I was recording everything to get him to stop, I didn’t get out of my car.
“I didn’t think he was going to kill me or anything, but this escalated and I wanted to get it on camera. I felt unsafe. I thought after it had been so long it would be okay, but it is .” still not very nice to watch (the video). He pulled onto the road and stopped the car again. When we turned left at the traffic lights, he stopped the car again. That meant he was following me. Then I called the police.”
District Judge Orla Austin asked Ms Isaacs what the long-term impact had been. She said: ‘When I’m alone in the car I always keep the doors locked, I’ve made sure my dashcam works. I work in television, mainly in London, and my daughter has had to take over more of my work because I don’t want to drive. Everyone seems so aggressive on the roads these days, I don’t want to be in this position again.”
The court heard Abbott was identified as the registered keeper of the Toyota involved in the road rage incident and was interviewed by police in October. He claimed he was in fact the victim of road rage as Ms Isaacs had blown her horn several times, flashed her lights at him and made a rude gesture.
He told the court: “The cause of this incident was the behavior of the witness. Despite what she said under oath in this court, she did not just blow her horn once, but blew and flashed her lights several times. I think there was road rage. I believed there was enough room, so I moved outside. I looked at her in my rearview mirror, she was flashing her lights and honking her horn and making a rude gesture at me.
“Rightly or wrongly, that’s the type of person I am. If someone behaves like that towards me, I want to say something, I’ll call him out on it. I’ll do it with anyone, regardless of gender, size or age. I’ll do it.” I don’t like people who film other people without their consent. I think it’s a violation of their privacy.
“The reason why the incident didn’t stop there is because I didn’t see any distress. What I saw was her smiling at me and filming me after I asked her to stop. It wasn’t a nervous laugh, it was a titillating laugh. Anger is not a rational function. I regret my behavior, but there are some statements I dispute.”
Shami Duggal, prosecuting, said: “In the footage you were extremely verbally abusive, threatening and intimidating. That was not reasonable behavior, was it?” Abbott responded: “No, I agree, but it was for a reason. It’s not against the law to be angry.”
Judge Orla Austin said she found Ms Isaacs a “completely credible witness” and found Abbott guilty. She said: “It is very clear to me from the footage that he was banging on her car. The level of anger was extremely high. I don’t believe you, I notice you did all those things and were completely threatening.
“The anger was out of all proportion to the incident. Your intention was to cause her harassment, alarm and fear. She was alone, you had repeatedly assaulted her, it was sustained abuse and had a significant effect on her.”