Driver led police on a 120mph pursuit along the A27

A DRIVER sped at up to 120mph on the A27 before doing a U-turn and driving the wrong way around a roundabout in a police chase.

Martin Appleton drove on the dual carriageway at Farlington in Portsmouth before being found drinking a bottle of wine.

At Portsmouth Crown Court yesterday the 47-yearold admitted dangerous driving in an Audi TT on October 20 last year.

Prosecutor Cerys Sayer said: ‘(He was) driving on an arterial road at 110/120mph down the A27, taking a U-turn, going round the roundabout anti-clockwise and doubling back on himself in a police pursuit.’

Appleton was ‘considering taking his own life on the night,’ his barrister Philip Allman said.

The defendant’s mother had been undergoing surgery that day, and he was leaving his partner.

Appleton was found 90 minutes after the police chase at a picnic table at a BP garage with a bottle of wine, another in the passenger seat. He admitted throwing another one away, his barrister said.

He claims he started drinking the wine after the police chase, and had drunk only one or two beers beforehand.

A roadside test found he had 82 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath. The legal limit is 35mcg.

Judge Tim Mousley QC ordered a judge must hear evidence about the drinking on June 8, with the defendant being sentenced afterwards.

Appleton, of Park Close Road, Alton, was banned from driving in the meantime.

The judge granted him bail until the next hearing.

He is facing a maximum two-year jail sentence.