Sheriff bans motorist for 16 months

FORT WILLIAM Sheriff Court heard last week how a Lochaber man had lost both his job and home after being caught nearly three times the drink-drive limit.

William Downs, 33, then of Shielfoot, Acharacle, but who now lives in Lanarkshire, had pleaded guilty earlier to the offence which took place on July 7 last year at Shielfoot.

Downs, who represented himself in court, told Sheriff Eilidh MacDonald he had been in the local hotel consoling a friend experiencing a difficult time and had intended leaving his vehicle in the hotel car park and walking the four miles home to his wife and young daughter.

But Downs, who has since retrained as an excavator operator and is now self-employed, told the court the bad weather had changed his mind.

He said: ‘There was adverse weather and I know I should have walked the four miles home, but felt it was not safe to do so. So I made the conscious choice to take the vehicle, regrettably. I lost my job and my home because of the impact of this incident.’

Downs was spotted driving the vehicle by a police mobile patrol. Officers had lost sight of the vehicle but eventually traced him and he was asked to take a breathalyser test.

Downs told the court he complied fully with the police, even volunteering 11 samples of breath due to a fault with the machine: ‘I then volunteered to give a blood sample to keep things right,’ he said. The blood test showed that Downs had 131mg of alcohol in 100ml of blood when the legal limit is 50mg.

Sheriff MacDonald fined Downs £500 and banned him from driving for 16 months.