Drunk driver: I just moved crashed car to safer place
38-YEAR-OLD DEFENDANT ESCAPES DRIVING BAN
A drunk man who jumped behind the wheel of a crashed car after the driver fled has escaped a disqualification.
Sheikh Ullah was nearly three times over the limit when police arrested him from the driver’s seat of the Nissan in Thornton Lodge.
But the learner driver argued he was only moving the vehicle a short distance to prevent it becoming a hazard to other road users.
The 38-year-old pleaded guilty to driving while over the prescribed limit, using a vehicle without insurance and driving otherwise than in accordance with a licence.
The offences occurred on July 29 after the vehicle was involved in a collision on Moorbottom Road, Kirklees magistrates were told.
Paul Dormand, prosecuting, said: “Just after 10pm police received a call from a witness reporting a vehicle had hit his friend’s car outside his house on Moorbottom Road.
“Officers attended, located the defendant and took samples of breath.
“The lower reading was 99 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath.”
This is nearly three times over the legal limit of 35 microgrammes.
The witness said he heard his friend shout out that somebody had hit his car.
He then witnessed Ullah getting into the driver’s side of the vehicle and drive from that location to nearby Thornton Lodge Road.
Police discovered he was only a provisional licence holder and there was no insurance for the car.
Ullah explained he moved the vehicle about 15 metres to a car park of a takeaway.
He said: “After the collision the driver fled and I got into the driver’s seat because it was bang in the middle of a junction. Yes, I was under the influence, but I moved the car because it was causing a disturbance in a heavily populated area.
“I was just moving the vehicle from a hazardous position to a private parking spot, I was just thinking for the greater good to let the traffic flow better.”
Mr Dormand said Ullah, of Moorbottom Road, could have waited for police to move the vehicle.
But he argued: “It was an hour and a half from the time of the collision to when I got booked in. If that vehicle was there at that junction for that time there would have been havoc.
“It’s a busy road. There’s 400 houses on Moorbottom Road and they’ve got two cars each so imagine the traffic.”
Ullah added that he didn’t seek to run away from his crimes and helped police as much as he could.
He said he was due to sit his driving test the day after his appearance at the Huddersfield court.
Offenders caught drink-driving normally receive an automatic ban but magistrates decided Ullah had successfully argued that he had special reasons for driving at the time.
They endorsed his licence with six penalty points. He was fined £180 with £85 costs and £32 victim surcharge.