A MOTORIST'S "wholesale deception" with a fake driving licence has put him behind bars for 18 months.

Paul Richard Murphy, 33, drove illegally for more than three years as he flouted two bans imposed by York magistrates, the city's crown court heard.

David Bradshaw, prosecuting, said that when Murphy should have been off the road, he committed a drink-driving offence, and in a separate incident, fled from the scene of a crash at Copmanthorpe crossroads before police arrived.

He even passed a driving test under a fake name to get himself an illegal full driving licence.

"You have perpetrated a wholesale deception, in fact on the whole system so far as driving is concerned, by refusing to accept your disqualification, and in a calculated and deliberate way, getting round it," Judge Peter Charlesworth told the former York-area man, who has been living in London for some years.

The judge commended PC Jonathan Stewart, whose painstaking detective work uncovered Murphy's fraud and led to his arrest.

Murphy, of Ancona Road, Plumstead, London, pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice.

Mr Bradshaw said magistrates banned Murphy in June 1994 for two years, after he was convicted of two offences each of driving while disqualified and without insurance.

He already had two previous convictions for driving while disqualified and two for drink-driving.

In September 1994, he successfully applied for a provisional licence in the name of Paul Jason Murphy, and in November 1994, passed a driving test in that name.

In May 1996, he refused to take a breath test after police stopped him and in July 1996, York magistrates banned him from driving under the false name for 18 months.

But the original two-year ban having expired, Murphy successfully applied for his old licence and continued driving.

On October 25 1996, he was involved in what the judge called a "very bad accident" at Copmanthorpe crossroads where he pulled out in front of four students, abandoned his vehicle and fled.

The court heard a probation report said that Murphy seemed to think that driving bans should not apply to people like him who needed their car for work.

For Murphy, Robin Frieze said: "He clearly gets his priorities wrong."

Murphy had his own, legitimate business. "He is a hard-working man who has been exceptionally misguided a very long time ago."

Updated: 11:17 Tuesday, November 27, 2001