Romeo Beckham Fined for Using Phone While Driving
Romeo Beckham has been fined and handed penalty points on his licence after being caught using his phone at the wheel of his Porsche 911 Carrera in central London.
The 23-year-old was stopped by police in Westminster last September when an officer spotted him at a red light with both hands on his mobile rather than on the steering wheel. Court documents show a woman sat beside him in the passenger seat, also looking at her phone, with an unrestrained dog on her lap.
Pc Luke Short, who made the stop, said Beckham appeared distracted and not in proper control of the powerful sports car as it waited at the lights on Victoria Street, just before 11.20am on 16 September.
“I looked across at the driver,” Pc Short said in his statement. “I saw that he ... had his head tilted down and appeared to be looking down at a mobile phone he was holding low in his lap, near the base of the steering wheel.”
The officer pulled the car over and challenged Beckham, then chose to give what he described as “words of advice” about the unsecured dog rather than pursuing a separate offence over the animal. Under Rule 57 of the Highway Code, dogs must be “suitably restrained” in a vehicle; failing to do so can lead to prosecution for driving without proper control or careless driving.
At Westminster magistrates’ court last Thursday, Beckham was convicted of being a driver not in a position to have proper control. Magistrate Phillip Jordan ordered him to pay a £440 fine and endorsed his licence with three penalty points. He must also pay £130 in costs and a £176 victim surcharge.
Police said Beckham had previously been offered the chance to settle the matter out of court by paying a fixed penalty and attending a driver-awareness course, a route that would have avoided criminal proceedings. He did not respond, and the case moved to court.
The incident inevitably draws comparison with his father’s well-publicised brush with the law. Almost seven years on from David Beckham’s own driving ban for using a mobile at the wheel, his son has now appeared before magistrates for a similar offence.
In 2019, the former England captain admitted using his phone in slow-moving traffic in the West End and received a six-month ban. He told the court then that he would miss driving his children – Romeo, then 16, Cruz, 14, and Harper, 7 – to school during his suspension.
For Romeo, who has been carving out his own path in football and fashion, the timing of the offence was striking. It came just days after he unveiled a new platinum-blond buzzcut at a New York Fashion Week event, a reminder that away from the catwalks and cameras, the rules of the road still apply as strictly as ever.
