new advice

[Sam King]

Hello,
I am supporting an 80 year old who has a charge of drunk driving. It would be great to write a letter in support to see if he can do a drunk drive course. It would be terrible if he lost his licence. Are there things we should put in a letter to the court to ask for a fine or for him to do a course? Sam

 

[SeanJoyceStephensons]

A drink driving rehabilitation course is something that is done alongside a ban and not in place of it. There is no course that can be done in the alternative to a ban and if he entered a guilty plea he would invariably face a ban given that the sentencing guidelines indicate that a ban is mandatory for this type of offence. There are two parts to the penalty:

1. Disqualification of between 12 and 36 months; AND
2. Either a fine, community order or prison sentence.

The two parts cannot be offset against each other and are two distinct parts of the penalty. The length of ban and severity of the second (punitive element) part of the sentence is dependent on the amount of alcohol in breath.

A drink driving course can reduce the ban by 25%.