Great Scott! A British man channeling his inner Marty McFly was clocked driving his DeLorean faster than 88 mph – but insisted: “I wasn’t trying to time travel!”
Nigel Mills, 55, was traveling in his $30,000 gull-winged car when he hit 89 mph, just over the precise speed needed to achieve “temporal displacement” in the “Back to the Future” trilogy, The Telegraph reported.
Hampered by the lack of a flux capacitor and 1.21 gigawatts, Mills didn’t vanish into the space-time continuum — and was busted for speeding near Margaretting, Chelmsford.
Luckily for him, though, a judge at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court made the case disappear over a technicality when the prosecution offered no evidence.
“I was being prosecuted for going 89 mph in a DeLorean. Wasn’t something special meant to happen at 88 mph?” the father-of-two said after the hearing.
“I can honestly say I wasn’t trying to time travel. It was at 11 a.m. on Sunday and the road was completely clear. I saw the guy with the speed gun and thought I better check my speed and low and behold, the letter turns up.”
Mills decided to fight the summons, which he received the same day some travelers set up a camp in his company’s parking lot.
“I was fed up, like most motorists, of being a law-abiding citizen but a soft target for the traffic police,” he said. “When I saw the travelers in the car park when I’m working on a Sunday it made me quite incensed.
“I’m a guy who pays his taxes and sticks to the law, but I’m stuck at work with travelers in the car park and the police won’t touch them,” he continued. “Why should I pay this speeding fine while they would get away with it?”
Mills, who bought the 34-year-old DeLorean in 2004, said the cult classic is “a little rattly” with just over 13,000 miles on the odometer.
“Ironically, I was done for speeding in the car that doesn’t get on the road much,” he said. “I only drive it three or four times a year and did just 200 miles last year.”
A police spokesman said: “Essex Police wants to make it clear we do not tolerate excessive speeds or poor driving on our roads.”
If only Mills had a Mr. Fusion, he could declare: “Roads? Where we’re going we don’t need roads!”