A paedophile ex-squaddie has been jailed after crashing a van with no effective brakes and a window blacked out with plastic into an oncoming car, seriously injuring its woman driver.

Kevin Convery's Vauxhall Combo had a smashed passenger window temporarily repaired with a black plastic sheet – meaning he could not see out to the side or use his nearside wing mirror – as well as no interior mirror and brakes that did not work.

Falkirk Sheriff Court heard that the incident occurred at about 4.30 pm on a Monday afternoon at pedestrian lights in Clackmannan Road, Alloa.

A silver Lexus car in front of Convery's van halted at the lights when they turned red.

Unable to stop his van due to lack of brakes, Convery tried to swerve around the Lexus, hitting a Hyundai, being driven by Pauline Robertson, then 48, in the opposing carriageway.

The impact pushed Ms Robertson's car diagonally onto the pavement, while Convery's Combo cannoned off the Hyundai into the offside rear and wing of the Lexus, effectively blocking both sides of the road.

The driver of a fourth vehicle ran to help Ms Robertson.

Prosecutor Rachel Wallace said: “Ms Robertson was screaming due to the pain.”

She was taken to the Forth Valley Royal Hospital, where a CT scan revealed she had a fractured sternum and overlying soft tissue injuries.

She was off work for nine weeks, suffering pain, restricted mobility, and affected sleep.

Convery's van was inspected by an authorised vehicle examiner.

Miss Wallace said: “He noticed that the nearside front door window was smashed and covered in non-transparent black plastic wrap obscuring the view of the nearside mirror.

“As a car-derived van with no view to the rear and no central interior mirror, there is a requirement to have a view of the nearside mirror.

“The brakes of the vehicle were found to be defective.”

Convery, an ex-Former Argyll and Sutherland Highlander, formerly of Bonnybridge, Stirlingshire, at the time of Clackmannan, and now of Edinburgh, pleaded guilty to causing serious injury by dangerous driving. 

Solicitor Lynn Swan, defending, said: “He realises he made a serious error.”

Sheriff Christopher Shead jailed Convery for 16 months and imposed a 40-month driving disqualification.

He said Convery had “a high level of culpability”. 

He said: “He was driving a van with brakes that didn't work, in the knowledge that they didn't work, in circumstances where the window was blacked out with plastic, and look what happened.

“The primary question for the court is whether a custodial sentence is appropriate in the public interest, and the answer to that is 'yes it is'.”

The court heard Convery had “a surprisingly varied” record, including a previous conviction for dangerous driving, and ranging from a 1995 conviction for having sex with a 14-year-old girl when he was 21, to a conviction last month (September 2024) for sending sexual messages to a paedophile-hunter whom he thought was a 13-year-old schoolgirl.

He was caught during a paedophile-hunter group “sting” outside the Scottish Parliament.

The Alloa dangerous driving incident happened on October 4th 2021. Sheriff Shead commented on the fact that the case had taken so long to come to court.

Convery showed no emotion as he was led down to the cells.