Level 3 checkpoints come close to home

Our daughter lives in Leixlip and during the week she was driving her husband to his work on the edge of town at 7.15am, writes Brian Byrne. Before they got to the gate there was a Garda checkpoint and a queue of cars. Since it was within a short distance, he got out to walk the rest of the way.

She then did a U-turn out of the queue and headed back home. One of the checkpoint cars drove after her, lights flashing, and pulled her over. The guard asked her why had she suddenly turned back from the checkpoint? "They must have thought I had something to hide," she said afterwards, adding that the guard seemed relieved when he looked in and realised that she probably wasn't a drug dealer.

He told her that she should have stayed in the queue and then turned back after the checkpoint. "But I didn't see the point in waiting another 15 minutes to get to it when I wasn't going any further," she says, with some clear logic.

It was the first time she had ever been chased down by a police car, even after 14 years in Australia where they're pretty good at that.

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