Driver education first took shape in the United Kingdom back in 1909, and a quarter‑century later the United States opened its inaugural high‑school driver’s ed class. The program promised hands‑on training and essential driving skills for fledgling motorists.
Since those early days, the industry has been riddled with stories of rogue instructors, hysterical pupils, and outright road‑rage incidents that would make anyone’s palms sweat. Below we count down the top 10 driver nightmares that proved just how wild a lesson can become.
Top 10 Driver Nightmares Unveiled
10 Traffic Delays And Shattered Elbows
Instructors must juggle reckless teens and irate motorists with a hefty dose of patience. For 64‑year‑old Chris Barnett, however, his pleas for calm fell on deaf ears as chaos unfolded on a busy Braintree, Essex road in 2015.
During a first‑time drive, Barnett’s student grew flustered at an intersection, creating a brief traffic snag. Within twenty seconds, two angry men in a Range Rover pulled up beside them, hurling a barrage of expletives.
Although Barnett repeatedly warned the duo that their encounter was being recorded, one driver stormed out of his vehicle and lunged toward the open passenger window, while his companion eagerly joined the fray.
Attempting to calm matters, Barnett swung the car door open—only to have it slammed shut hard onto his arm. The aggressors fled as quickly as they had arrived, leaving Barnett with what he calls “the worst road‑rage incident … in his career,” and a broken elbow as his only souvenir.
9 French Inhale
Choosing to dull one’s senses before a driving exam is a reckless gamble, especially when the guide entrusted with a teen’s safety encourages it. In 2015, Eric Robertson, owner of Drive Tech in Albuquerque, suggested his tense 15‑year‑old pupil drive to his home so they could smoke marijuana together.
When the teenager declined, Robertson escalated his attempt at persuasion by pulling the girl behind a building, asking if she had ever “French inhaled.” He then lit a joint, exhaled the smoke directly into her mouth, and pressed a kiss to her cheek.
The escapade ended abruptly when police arrested Robertson, charging him with child abuse and supplying a minor with drugs. Ironically, the judge sent him to a driver’s education class of his own, highlighting the paradox of a traffic‑law violator running a school.
Parents’ frustration grew when Drive Tech shut its doors without refunds or notice. One angry parent recalled paying $350, only to find the school vanished, leaving them clueless about whom to contact for help.
8 History Of Wrongdoings
In 2011, Mercer County, Iowa, dismissed driver’s‑ed teacher Dan Correll after a string of complaints about his bizarre conduct. Between 2009 and 2011, Correll was cited repeatedly for falling asleep both in the classroom and behind the wheel, and for making inappropriate comments toward female staff and students.
Five years later, the Iowa Department of Transportation faced a scandal involving 62‑year‑old examiner John Alexander, who, during a test, instructed a 49‑year‑old woman to pull into a parking lot, then forced her to view explicit photos and a masturbation video on his phone.
7 Failure At Its Finest
Driving exams are already nerve‑wracking, but none expected a student’s frustration to morph into a murderous sprint. In 2013, a 21‑year‑old woman failed her test after hitting a cone at the Mayfield Heights, Ohio BMV site, then blamed her instructor for the failure.
After a brief exchange, the instructor stepped out of the vehicle. The enraged student floored the accelerator, barreling straight toward her teacher. The instructor leapt aside just in time, narrowly avoiding a collision that could have turned the windshield into a splatter of glass.
6 Night Beatdown
During his final lesson in 2016, 16‑year‑old Dominic Elliott sensed a vehicle tailing him. Instructor Robert Ross, feeling uneasy, ordered a U‑turn at a traffic light. To their shock, the trailing car turned out to be a police patrol.
Six deputies swarmed the scene with weapons drawn. Despite Ross’s repeated explanations that Elliott was a student driver, officers handcuffed the teenager and inflicted a serious arm injury. Only after realizing Elliott had no warrants did they release him.
Elliott’s parents sued Drive America, alleging the school’s faulty license plate made the car appear stolen, prompting the police response. The teen eventually recovered, returned to the road, and earned his license a year later.
5 And Another For The Road
In 2017, staff at Joliet Central High discovered instructor Nestor M. Nowak slumped over the wheel outside the main entrance, initially presumed to have suffered a stroke. Ambulance crews arrived, only to learn Nowak’s blood alcohol content was more than three times the legal limit.
Court documents revealed Nowak’s 13 prior traffic violations, including a DUI three years earlier. That same year, a German instructor was arrested after driving while so intoxicated he failed to brake, crashing a teen’s vehicle into a house. Meanwhile, a Cape Town instructor logged a blood‑alcohol level twelve times over the limit, causing a crash that sent a 17‑year‑old into a residential structure.
4 Mommy Dearest
In 2016, Ilyse Levine‑Kanji drove her 18‑year‑old son 171 kilometers to his driver’s exam, only to be told the instructor deemed the test “unsafe” and cancelled it on the spot. The instructor refused to reconsider, prompting Levine‑Kanji into a violent frenzy.
She grabbed a ballpoint pen and attempted to stab the instructor, then, when restrained, resorted to biting his forearm, leaving several lacerations. After the chaotic episode, she and her son fled the site.
Shortly afterward, state troopers stopped them on the Mass Pike and arrested Levine‑Kanji for assault with a dangerous weapon. This was not her first brush with the law; in 2013 she was placed on probation for punching a woman at a children’s pool party.
3 Doughnut Run
Late 2016 found Malisa L. Stocker, a North Marion High driver‑ed employee in Florida, crashing the school vehicle during a routine Dunkin’ Donuts run. In a desperate cover‑up, she falsified paperwork and tried to have the wreck repaired at the district’s bus garage.
She concocted a story that a student had crashed into a tree, then sneaked onto campus at night to create fake tire tracks and affix tree bark to the car. When the ruse began to crumble, Stocker tried to coerce a student into signing a false confession.
The situation worsened when she realized the vehicle had struck a senior citizen’s car. She discouraged the elderly man from filing a report and withheld insurance details. Superintendent Heidi Maier condemned the actions, calling for Stocker’s immediate dismissal.
2 Love Is In The Air
In Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, a 45‑year‑old female driving instructor, Angel F. Owens, became obsessively fixated on a 15‑year‑old student, bombarding her with 650 phone calls and over 12,000 sexually charged texts between February and July 2016.
Owens handed the teen an iPhone on the condition it stay hidden from her parents. When the girl refused, Owens threatened to “make the victim’s family disappear.” She later presented the teen with an engraved charm bracelet and demanded the girl call her “momma,” lashing out if the demand wasn’t met.
After the student finally told Owens to leave her alone, the instructor escalated by repeatedly driving by the girl’s home and sending messages that she would kill herself. Detectives intervened, Owens confessed to stalking, and was arrested on charges of indecent behavior with a juvenile and stalking, with bond set at $140,000.
1 Unanswered Questions
In 2014, a routine lesson in Waterville, Ohio turned fatal when 16‑year‑old Joseph Franks ignored a stop sign, and his 48‑year‑old instructor Thomas Smith failed to intervene. Their vehicle slammed into a minivan, flipping end‑over‑end onto a nearby yard.
The minivan driver, 48‑year‑old Kathleen Woods, escaped with non‑life‑threatening injuries, but both Franks and Smith were pronounced dead at the scene.
Investigators uncovered that Smith had a recent history of traffic infractions, including a collision just four days earlier when his personal car was struck by a pickup after he failed to yield at a stop sign.
Adam is just a hubcap trying to hold on in the fast lane.