Drink driver crashed into wall trying to get phone
The court heard that Cuthbertson had done the right thing and got a taxi home following a night out drinking on December 2, but then, once inside the house, realised he had left his phone in the taxi.
Mark Richardson, defending, said: “His partner was able to track the phone using her mobile phone.”
He said he discovered the phone was still in the taxi which was showing it was just a short distance away in Hetton’s Suffolk
Street.
He said his client then made the wrong decision to drive his own car to where the taxi was to retrieve the mobile phone.
Cuthbertson crashed his Seat Leon into a wall on the way to get the phone and when breathalysed by police he was found to have 103 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath, with the limit being 35.
A spokesman for the probation service said: “He had been out drinking that night in the town and got a taxi home, everything was OK. On getting into the house he realised he had left his mobile phone in the taxi.
“He basically made a silly decision and just jumped in the car.
“Due to the drinking he has managed to collide with a brick wall.
“He realises he has made a stupid decision and there were other options he could have taken.”
The probation officer said Cuthbertson is a man of previous good character and he was confident he wouldn’t be back before the courts again.
Mr Richardson said: “It was a bad decision. He very much regrets that decision and he will have to live with the consequences.”
Richardson, a self-employed mechanic, was banned from driving for 24 months. He was also given a 12-month community order, which will include 140 hours of unpaid work to be carried out.