Road-rage victim, 60, who was screamed at outside Tesco says she ‘doesn’t want him to do it to anyone else’
The victim of a shocking road-rage outburst which left her terrified has slammed the perpetrator as a “horrible man and a bully” after he was convicted of threatening behaviour.
Samantha Isaacs, in her late 50s, had been subjected to a slew of vile insults by 60-year-old Peter Abbott after she beeped at him when he cut her off outside a Tesco petrol station in Dorset.
Abbott had pulled out in front of Isaacs, prompting the mother-of-three to honk her horn and slam on her brakes – to which he responded by throwing obscene gestures and bringing his car to a halt.
His litany of verbal abuse even prompted a third party to intervene – and when Abbott was questioned on why he was attacking a woman on her own, he claimed Isaacs was “f**king bloody annoying”.
Footage of the incident was shown at Poole Magistrates’ Court – where Abbott was standing on trial for using threatening words or behaviour to cause alarm, distress or fear of violence.
Despite denying the charge, claiming “it’s not against the law to be angry”, Abbott was found guilty of the offence.
Isaacs told the court that Abbott “completely” cutting her up had forced her to hit the brakes so hard her belongings had been thrown to the floor.
She said that when he approached her vehicle, the 60-year-old asked her what she thought she was doing, hit her car, and called her names like “f**king s**g” and “wh***”.
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Isaacs said that she had taken the decision to video the 60-year-old’s barrage of abuse – including him banging his fists on her vehicle – in order to make him stop.
After leaving the petrol station, Isaacs said she overtook Abbott – but soon “realised how stupid” her decision was, as it meant he could have followed her, prompting her to call the police.
In court, Abbott claimed he had, in fact, been the victim of road rage thanks to Isaac’s honking, headlight-flashing and gesturing – and blamed Isaacs for starting the incident.
He said: “Rightly or wrongly, I am the type of person [that] if someone behaves like that to me I will want to say something – I will call them out on it. I will do it with anyone, whatever gender, size or age they are.
Abbott also took aim at the mother-of-three for recording the incident, claiming he thought it amounted to a violation of his privacy.
Shami Duggal, prosecuting, said: “In the footage you were being extremely verbally abusive, threatening and intimidating… That wasn’t reasonable behaviour was it?” – to which Abbott replied: “No I would agree, but it wasn’t without cause. It’s not against the law to be angry.”
Judge Orla Austin said she found Isaacs to be an “entirely credible witness”, and found Abbott guilty, adding: “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 find you did all those things and were entirely threatening. The anger was out of all proportion to the incident.
“Your intention was to cause her harassment, alarm and distress. She was on her own, you repeatedly targeted her, it was sustained abuse and had a significant effect on her.”
Austin warned Abbott that he could be imprisoned, as the incident was the “most serious” of this kind of offence – and he had put the victim through a trial, despite “overwhelming evidence”.
Abbott’s sentencing has been adjourned until later in May.