The 28-year-old man charged with causing the deaths of Carla Maxima-Collins and her two sons by dangerous driving has been banned from returning behind the wheel until after he goes on trial.
Senior magistrate Gillian David-Scotland ordered the ban yesterday as she granted Kelvin Lewis $350,000 bail.
Lewis appeared before her in the Arima Magistrate's Court on five charges arising out of last Thursday's fatal crash.
David-Scotland added the condition to Lewis' bail after police prosecutor police prosecutor Sgt Joseph Jugmohan objected to him being released on the basis that he had allegedly committed the offences less than two years after being convicted of drunk driving in 2015.
Lewis' lawyer, Hayden Pierre, challenged the objection as he claimed that there was no connection to the current case as his client was not charged for drunk driving a second time.
"When the accused was taken to hospital blood samples were taken from his for toxicology testing. The samples have been submitted to the Forensic Science Centre and once the results are available and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is consulted, additional charges may follow," Jugmohan said, as he noted that the police investigation was still ongoing.
David-Scotland eventually granted Lewis bail as she said the offences he was charged with were bailable.
However, she took his previous conviction into account and applied several conditions to his bail including seizing his driver's permit for the duration of his case and ordering Lewis to surrender his passport.
Lewis, of Fairview Drive, D'Abadie, is facing three charges of causing death by dangerous driving (one for each victim), one for breaching a red light and another for the illegal use of the Priority Bus Route (PBR).
Dressed in a black shirt and jeans, Lewis, who wore a bandage over his left eye, stood silently in the prisoner's enclosure as the charges were being read.
Lewis pleaded guilty to breaking the red light and using the PBR but was not immediately sentenced by David-Scotland as the police officer, who charged him, was not present in court and failed to hand over the file on the investigation to prosecutors.
The accident took place around 11 pm last Thursday at the PBR junction with Mausica Road in D'Abadie.
Maxima-Collins, her husband Keston, her sons Amani, two, and seven-month-old Kamari were heading south along Mausica Road when Lewis' car collided with theirs. The mother and sons were catapulted from the vehicle and landed at the side of the road, where they died on the scene. Keston, a cook with the T&T Coast Guard, was driving and survived with minor injures.
Lewis is scheduled to reappear in court on March 2.