TWO women racially abused a taxi driver during a late-night journey across Carlisle after he told them they should not eat and drink in his cab.

The driver collected 25-year-old Shanie Phillipson and the second woman on the evening of August 25 last year and immediately told them they were not allowed into the cab with the cans of beer and lager they had.

The man also then told them not to eat in the cab as Phillipson began tucking into a packet of crisps, magistrates heard. As the journey got underway, the women began verbally abusing the driver.

Phillipson sat behind the driver and made comments suggesting he was a paedophile. When she began eating crisps, and he asked to not do that, she responded by saying she was allowed to eat whatever she wanted “in my own country.”

The man was also subjected to homophobic abuse.

Though the prosecution accepted that the second woman involved, who has not been identified, was the main protagonist in the abuse, Phillipson had joined in and the two women had both used the same kind of abusive language.

Prosecutor Graeme Tindall told the city’s Rickergate court: “It has caused the taxi driver considerable upset. He said he has been in this country for nine years and only suffered racism on two occasions.

“This was one of them.

“He believes that everybody should be treated equally, and it made him feel sad. He did not argue because they were abusing him, and he didn’t want to get into an argument with them.”

He felt he needed to concentrate on his driving.

After the journey, aware that they were filming the encounter, the victim feared the women would post some of the encounter on Facebook.

In a statement, he said: “It made me feel extremely stressed; I dreaded going to work and feared that they hadn’t gone away.”

In the weeks after the incident, the driver’s wife had struggled to sleep because she was worried about her husband while he was at work.

Phillipson, of Boundary Road, Currock, admitted using racially aggravated threatening and abusive words and behaviour.

Steven Marsh, defending, said the defendant had a long history of anxiety and depression, which dated back to when she was aged 14. Though she had been given antidepressants, Phillipson had been given no other treatment.

“She accepts she was intoxicated,” said the lawyer.

“She has no recollection of the actual incident. It started with an argument over taking cans of drink into the taxi. The cans were discarded, and she then started to eat crisps but was told to stop doing that.

“It was at that point that the comments started.”

It was the second woman passenger who had told the driver she would get her boyfriend to smash the driver’s face in, said Mr Marsh. At that point, said the lawyer, Phillipson had gestured to the other woman to get her to stop.

“The defendant apologised to the taxi driver for other matters, including putting her feet on the sill,” continued Mr Marsh, accepting that Phillipson had joined in with some of the offensive comments.

Since the incident, the defendant had disassociated herself from some of the people she was spending time with. The other woman was not somebody Phillipson even knew, said Mr Marsh, and that second woman had not been caught.

The lawyer added that Phillipson would welcome Probation Service intervention and she was suitable for rehabilitation.

The presiding magistrate told the defendant: “It’s not the first time you have been in court for not being able to keep a lid on it.” The magistrates imposed a 12-month community order which includes 15 rehabilitation activity days.

Phillipson must also observe 80 days of electronically monitored alcohol abstinence and pay £200 compensation to the victim, as well as a £114 victim surcharge.