Former Chelsea star N’Golo Kante has been ordered to pay more than £1,000 after he was convicted over a driving offence he says was committed by someone else.
The World Cup winner, 33, was taken to court by the Metropolitan Police after the driver of a Mercedes registered in his name was seen using a phone at the wheel.
Kante switched from Chelsea to Saudi Arabia last summer and was playing in the Middle Eastern country at the time of the offence, in October last year.
The Met Police said Kante had emailed the force to give the name and address of the person he says was responsible for the driving crime.
But he faced prosecution after the Met said he had failed to put the information on an official form.
Kante was convicted in a private Single Justice Procedure hearing on April 6, when a magistrate ordered him to pay a £660 fine, a £264 victim surcharge, and costs of £110. He will also have six penalty points added to his UK driving licence.
The financial penalty, totalling £1034, amounts to around half an hour of Kante’s reported earnings for Saudi side Al-Ittihad. The maximum fine for this offence is £1000.
The Met Police initiated the criminal prosecution with a letter to the Chelsea training ground in Cobham, Surrey, after Kante’s highly-publicised departure from the West London club.
In court papers obtained by The Standard, Linda Humphrey, a member of Met Police staff, set out how a member of the public, Ivo Lazarov, reported the Mercedes registered to Kante over suspected phone use while driving at 8.32am on October 18 last year in Strawberry Vale, Richmond upon Thames.
Two days after the incident, Kante turned out for Al-Ittihad in a 1-1 Saudi Pro League draw in Jeddah – in which Karim Benzema scored a goal and an own goal.
In her witness statement, Ms Humphrey said a notice of intended prosecution was sent to Kante at the Chelsea training ground in late October, and the footballer replied by email on November 28.
“I received an email from the registered keeper, N’Golo Kante, stating he was abroad and was not driving the vehicle at the time of the offence and named the insured driver’s name and address, and requested to send the notice of intended prosecution to the named driver’s address”, she said, adding that he said he would struggle to return the form within the police’s 28-day deadline.
Ms Humphrey said she replied to Kante “stating I am unable to change the system to the insured driver as the notice of intended prosecution is a legal document and has to be filled in and signed by himself, nominating the driver.”
She said Kante was sent a digital version of the form he has to fill in, and a “final reminder” was also dispatched in December to Kante’s email address as well as to the Chelsea training ground.
“No completed response has been received from N’Golo Kante”, she said.
Kante did not enter a plea to the charge of failing to give information relating to the identification of the driver of a vehicle when required.
He was convicted in a private Single Justice Procedure hearing which had been twice delayed for unknown reasons.
Details of Kante’s hearing this month were omitted from court lists that are sent to the media.
A representative for Kante has been contacted for comment on the case.
