Arrested for a drink driving incident, blew 107, please help! Any advice?

[richh_o]

Hi, I've made the terrible mistake of driving after drinking and I was arrested on Saturday night. Having attended a birthday party, a friend had asked me to take him home that night as he had to travel in the morning and stupidly I decided to drive after the party. We ended up getting in a little accident, where I hit the rear of another car as I didn't slow down in time, thankfully no one was hurt. The police arrived and arrested me and took me in where I had blown 107, this is my first time getting in any kind of trouble and I have only been driving for about 6 weeks. I haven't been able to eat or sleep since this has all happened and just wanted to know what sort of thing was going to happen to me with the court date in 2 weeks. I know I am in the wrong and it is a terrible mistake that I have deciding to drive. I'm 22, a masters student and my parents don't live in the country so i'm really nervous with how all of this is going to go. Can anyone please give me any advice on what to do in preparation for court and what is likely going to my punishment. This has a terrible decision on my behalf and this whole experience will truly haunt me. I hope someone will be able to help shed some light on my situation for me.

Thank you for taking the time to read and for any advice you are able to give me.

 

[TipsyNurse]

Hi and welcome to the forums.

I know it's difficult but it's important to put things in perspective - as you say no-one was injured, which if you had braked a fraction later could well have happened.

With your result you are likely to get about 100 hours of community service and about a two year ban, possibly slightly more as you had an accident which will be seen as an aggravating factor. Because of the result you will be seen as a high risk offender and you will need to pass a DVLA medical exam before you get your licence back.

If you want to speak to the duty solicitor arrive early and ask the usher (person running around with a clipboard) to point them out. You won't get representation in court unless you pay because you won't receive a custodial sentence.

In court dress smartly and be respectful to the magistrates, staff and prosecutor. The process will be fairly quick. The prosecutor will set out their case and then you will be asked to stand and say anything you want to. The best bet is to apologise to the driver you hit and to other road users that you placed at risk. Say you regret wasting the courts time and intend never to be there again.

If you refer to the night make sure you do not give any room for the magistrates to believe that you had agreed to give your friend a lift home before the party, as that would imply that you always intended to drive after drinking, or you couldn't control your drinking. Ensure anything you say is not an excuse or justification for driving. If in doubt, stick to apologies, you want to make sure they understand it was a one-off event.

You may wish to take character references from lecturers or other people of standing in the community to show your otherwise good character. Take five copies with you, three for the magistrates, one for the clerk and one for the prosecutor. The only potential risk is if your local newspaper runs DD stories and there is a journalist in the public gallery they may take more interest if they know you are a masters student. Magistrates seldom stray far from their sentencing guidelines anyway.

After that the magistrates will retire briefly and then come back and give you your sentence. If you want to do the DD course, which costs ~£200 and reduces your ban by 25%, ask now as you can't get it afterwards (and there is no obligation to take if they do award it). Any ban will take effect immediately so don't drive to court.

There isn't much more to say than that. Although magistrates tend to be stern they also tend to try and walk you through the process if you aren't represented. If you look very nervous that is probably a good thing! Afterwards if you have to do community service you just need to liase with the probation service to get it booked in.

 

[Medicine Man]

Hi richh_o,

In addition to the sound advice that Tipsy Nurse has given, I’d recommend getting to the court a bit earlier before your case and sitting in the public gallery (obviously not possible if you’re first up!) as I did this recently and it definitely put my mind at ease as you can see what the Magistrates are like beforehand and, presuming you haven’t been in court before, see what the procedure and general running order is. At the end of the day, we’re all humans and we make mistakes!

Good luck to you!

MM

 

[richh_o]

Hi
Thank you both, very much, for your fast responses, everything you have said has helped me a lot, considering, as you can imagine, this is a pretty nerve-racking time for me.

I have ben trying to figure out whether or not I should hire a solicitor and how I would go about doing this, just because I think they may be able to ease the process of court for me, as I don't want to say the wrong thing and it hurts the outcome of the magistrates decision. Also i'm not sure about what the costs of getting a solicitor is like and as I said previously I'm student and I don't really have a lot of excess money to spare, but will do so if necessary, so any advice of that would be much appreciated.

But thanks again for the replies.

 

[TipsyNurse]

Hi
Thank you both, very much, for your fast responses, everything you have said has helped me a lot, considering, as you can imagine, this is a pretty nerve-racking time for me.

I have ben trying to figure out whether or not I should hire a solicitor and how I would go about doing this, just because I think they may be able to ease the process of court for me, as I don't want to say the wrong thing and it hurts the outcome of the magistrates decision. Also i'm not sure about what the costs of getting a solicitor is like and as I said previously I'm student and I don't really have a lot of excess money to spare, but will do so if necessary, so any advice of that would be much appreciated.

But thanks again for the replies.

It is up to you. For a guilty plea a solicitor is likely to do little more than hold your hand, you have to decide whether this is worth the money which will probably be £150 up.

If you are respectful and do not say anything that sounds like an excuse or justification, or as I said the DD was premeditated, then you cannot go far wrong. Magistrates tend to stick to their sentencing guidelines.

You will see in court lots of people turning up in tracksuits who are rude and sullen. By dressing smartly and being polite you show the magistrates you understand the importance of the case - it is, after all, a criminal trial albeit you are a long way from crime of the century.