Tip-off snared drink-driver

Police stopped motorist at lights

A boozed- up motorist was more than three times over the drink-drive limit when he was snared by cops.

Oil worker Damian Cochrane, 34, was fined £1,600 and banned from the road for 30 months at Paisley Sheriff Court this week.

Officers received a tip-off from a concerned witnesses who suspected he was intoxicated at around 11pm on January 27 this year.

Cochrane, of Greenlaw Crescent, Paisley, was stopped and questioned by officers when his car stopped at a red traffic light. They smelled alcohol on his breath and, in a subsequent screening after being arrested, he was found to have 174 milligrams of alcohol in his blood. The legal limit is 50.

When he appeared in the dock at the town’s sheriff court, he admitted committing the offence.

Defence agent Mark Chambers said that his client, who worked as a services team leader and had substantial earnings, had been drinking locally on the date in question with no intention to drive, but had foolishly decided to take the car when they left the bar after he was encouraged to do so by a friend.

“He appreciates it was a moment of madness and he is deeply ashamed,” said the lawyer.

“He knows it was wrong and it was foolish.”

Sheriff Susan Sinclair said the reading was “very high” but noted that Cochrane was a first offender who had never been in trouble before.

She ordered him to pay the financial penalty at £250 per week.