A Scots TikTok joyrider who put lives in danger taking part in an online craze linked to 12 deaths in the past week has been allowed to walk free from court. Kane McDonald admitted endangering lives by driving across a busy public park and through a pedestrian underpass as he filmed himself and posted the joyride on TikTok for likes.
The 29-year-old father was branded “a moron” by a sheriff after he admitted endangering adults and children during the social media stunt in Dundee. But McDonald dodged jail at Dundee Sheriff Court as Sheriff Tim Niven-Smith instead ordered him to stay indoors from 9pm to 7am for 12 months.
Fatal joyriding craze
Five balaclava-clad teenagers died in a head-on crash which left four people seriously injured as they filmed themselves joyriding in a stolen car on the M9 in County Kildare, Ireland, on 16 August. A further five youngsters and two police officers died in an apparent copycat ‘TikTok joyride’ on the A66 at Middlesbrough in the early hours of Saturday morning.
However, McDonald - who has been involved in similar previous incidents - was ordered to carry out 300 hours unpaid work and banned from driving for two years. He admitted a series of driving offences, including racing off-road across Caird Park in a Nissan X-Trail while being filmed. He was recognised from the uploaded video and arrested.
Sheriff's rebuke
Sheriff Niven-Smith said: “The court has a duty to protect the public. To drive a vehicle in the manner you did on both occasions would pose a risk to yourself, occupants of your vehicle and any person going about their business. You should consider yourself very lucky. Your culpability was high and the potential seriousness was high. The voluntary consumption of drugs is never a mitigating factor.
“There is an athletics track and golf course and it is used pretty heavily by families and children for recreational purposes - and this moron is driving solely for his own gratification. He is having it filmed and uploading it to social media. How would he react if he was taking his nine-year-old daughter down to Caird Park to play football and a lunatic came up in a large SUV and mounted the grass? I’m sure he would have something to say about that.”
Fiscal depute Carrie-Anne Mackenzie told the court schoolchildren would have been in the park as McDonald raced through it during the late afternoon stunt. She said: “Police observed a vehicle of interest and they activated blue lights and tried to make ground on it. Officers observed the Nissan mount the grass verge.”
Police requested permission to pursue McDonald and the court was told that he accelerated away across the grass and through an underpass before entering a retail park. “The vehicle was later found abandoned near the golf course in Caird Park. Later that evening, the accused uploaded video of himself to a TikTok account. It showed an unknown person filming him whilst he was driving the Nissan along the public footpath without having any regard to public safety,” the prosecutor said. McDonald posted the footage with the hashtag #burner.
Previous incidents
McDonald, from Dundee, admitted culpably and recklessly endangering the public with his driving and by being filmed on 28 June 2021. He also admitted driving dangerously, failing to stop and having no L plates or insurance on 31 January 2022. The cases were repeatedly delayed by McDonald’s failure to appear in court.
Solicitor Alanna Bryant, defending, said: “At the time he was misusing substances. He had the wrong peer group. For a couple of years his lifestyle was chaotic. A period in custody would send him backwards.”
McDonald was also ordered to carry out unpaid work after a court heard he was a passenger in a Land Rover with false plates which rammed a police car during a 30-mile chase. Brandon Williams, 25, and fellow backseat passenger Dylan Adams, 21, lobbed missiles - including a stolen car battery and a crowbar - at pursuing officers while they filmed the chase to post on TikTok.
Perth Sheriff Court heard how third passenger McDonald, and a fourth man escaped on foot into a field. McDonald was found hiding behind a trailer at a nearby farmhouse and he was convicted of reset. The fourth man, who McDonald claimed was the driver, was never traced. In a separate jury trial, McDonald was found not proven on a charge of driving dangerously during the 45-minute chase.
Sheriff William Wood jailed Williams - who had previously been seriously injured in a moped crash - for 46 weeks and said: “Given the gravity of this conduct - which would have put police officers in considerable danger - I am going to impose a custodial sentence.” Scaffolder Adams, who was 16 at the time of the 2020 incident, was placed on supervision for a year and ordered to carry out 110 hours of unpaid work.
In April 2022, McDonald was fined and banned from driving for 27 months after he admitted putting youths at risk during a high-speed pursuit through rural Angus.
