Drunk crash driver walks free by blaming ‘abusive’ boyfriend
A LAW graduate who drove while almost three times the drink limit has escaped a jail sentence after she said she had been driven to alcohol by a controlling boyfriend.
Foziea Parveen, 29, swerved around the road, mounted a curb and “bounced” off a building in her BMW, a court heard.
But she walked free despite serving a previous jail term for dangerous driving and driving while disqualified.
Parveen – who worked for her family’s retail firm – did not have a full driving licence and was uninsured to drive Foziea Parveen outside Manchester magistrates court this week where she escaped jail for driving her BMW while nearly three times the road alcohol limit the 155mph 5 series car. She admitted drink-driving but told Manchester magistrates she had been “in distress” after complaining to police about her allegedly abusive boyfriend.
The drama took place at 5.30am on February 5 while Parveen, of Stoke-on-Trent, was in Manchester visiting her unnamed partner.
Prosecutor Matthew Treece said: “She was driving a white BMW and a witness was driving behind her. She continued on up a road, swerving in the street. The car mounted the kerb and bounced off a building before coming to a stop.”
A breath test showed Parveen had 100 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath. The legal limit is 35 microgrammes.
Parveen was banned from driving for a year in 2012 for refusing a breath test.
She was given a suspended sentence for dangerous driving and driving while banned and later jailed for 16 days after she missed probation appointments.
Parveen, who also admitted having no licence or insurance, was this week given 20 weeks jail suspended for 18 months and banned from driving for four years and four months. She was also ordered to be electronically tagged for 20 weeks and to pay £735 in costs and surcharges.
Simon Morton, defending, said Parveen had poor health and was “struggling” to leave “an abusive relationship”.
Magistrates’ chairman Peter Thompson said: “These are exceptional circumstances.”
But he told her: “You could have taken a life. It’s simply not acceptable to drink the amount you did and drive.”