Custodial sentence likelihood

[ascott1988]

Hi

I stupidly drove back from a night out with friends 2 days ago after drinking. It was a short journey of around half a mile at midnight.

I was alone & hit a parked car on the journey, no one was injured, the police arrived & breathalysed me & my score was 100, I was taken to hospital as the airbags deployed despite there being no injuries. Bloods were taken approximately 4 hours later due to delays at the hospital.

This is my first offence of any kind & I complied with the police throughout the process on the night. I’m extremely remorseful & will be giving up alcohol (infrequent drinker anyway).

My main concern is a custodial sentence, I can manage a driving ban & fortunately work close to home most of the time.

Assuming the blood alcohol level is in line with or lower than the breathalyser reading, how likely is a custodial sentence & are there any steps I can take between now & the court date to minimise the risk?

Thanks

 

[Xeronema]

Hey @ascott1988 , welcome to the forum.

I'll start by saying that a custodial sentence isn't going to happen, not for a first offence and given that the blood test was done 4 hours after providing a BrAC (breath alcohol content) of 100mg/100ml breath, it's l̷̷̷i̷̷̷k̷̷̷e̷̷̷l̷̷̷y̷̷̷ possible that you won't even fall into the typical sentencing bracket for a custodial sentence anyway. They could do back calculations, however that is also very unlikely to happen. Back calculations are not cheap and they usually only do them for cases where people have been seriously injured (more so for 3rd parties).

Just out of interest, how much did you have to drink? I ask this because I'm trying to gauge whether or not your BAC (blood alcohol content) was rising or coming down. If your BAC was coming down, it's entirely possible that you'll also avoid being a HRO (high risk offender) - as long as this is your only drink drive conviction. If your BAC results come back under 200mg/100ml blood, you won't be classified as a HRO and you won't have to go through a DVLA medical to get your licence back - as long as you don't have any underlying medical conditions that would require you to have a medical beforehand (examples of this are past drug/alcohol misuse/dependency or any other medical condition that require such a medical).

As long as your BrAC/BAC was falling at the point of being arrested, worse case scenario you'll be looking at a 28 month disqualification and a community order (community service). In my opinion that's the worst possible outcome.

Don't forget to show y̷̷̷o̷̷̷u̷̷̷r̷̷̷ remorse, dress smartly for court and ask for the Drink Drive Rehabilitaion Course (on completion of the course this will reduce your disqualification by up to 25%, so it's worth doing. Some insurance companies will also give you a discount for having completed the course). You can't ask to go on the course after the fact. It could take up to 6 months for your blood test to come back, so there might be a bit of a wait. I'd also recommend that you write an apology letter (this will be read by the magistrates/district judge) and if you can get some character referrences (from friends, family, employer, etc), that would also be helpful. Hopefully you won't have to wait that long because as I'm sure you'll soon realise, if you haven't already, the period of time immediately after your arrest and before your court apperance is the hardest part. Once you've been sentenced you'll feel a lot better (most people do).

I'll say it again, just in case you need to read it again; you won't be given a custodial sentence, you aren't going to prison.

 

[ascott1988]

Hi

Thanks so much for taking the time to reply & for the advice, it’s very reassuring.

On your question, I’d had approximately 10 pints of lager (4 to 4.5%), starting at 5pm & finishing my last drink around 11.30pm, I had a substantial meal around 6pm which I believe helps in processing the alcohol.

Would you recommend getting a solicitor for this sort of case?

Thanks again

 

[Xeronema]

Hi

Thanks so much for taking the time to reply & for the advice, it’s very reassuring.

On your question, I’d had approximately 10 pints of lager (4 to 4.5%), starting at 5pm & finishing my last drink around 11.30pm, I had a substantial meal around 6pm which I believe helps in processing the alcohol.

Would you recommend getting a solicitor for this sort of case?

Thanks again

I'd always recommend using a solicitor to forum members, especially if they can comfortably afford to hire one. I err on the side of caution because people don't always tell the whole truth (I'm not suggesting you aren't, just that it happens). Personally, if I was in your shoes, I wouldn't bother, at least not at this point in time anyway. I'd wait until you get your blood test results back first.

You could try and use the duty solicitor. One thing I'd be remiss to mention, about the duty solicitor; you can't always get one. They prioritise the more severe cases (for example, ones that involve a strong chance of a custodial sentence), so yours won't be high up on their list. If there are a lot of court rooms running back to back, one may not be available.

If you're going to plead guilty, wait until you get the results back. I see you've created a thread in the legal sub-section of this forum - that's good.

 

[ascott1988]

Thanks for your help. It’s much appreciated.

 

[Deleted member 22070]

Hi

I stupidly drove back from a night out with friends 2 days ago after drinking. It was a short journey of around half a mile at midnight.

I was alone & hit a parked car on the journey, no one was injured, the police arrived & breathalysed me & my score was 100, I was taken to hospital as the airbags deployed despite there being no injuries. Bloods were taken approximately 4 hours later due to delays at the hospital.

This is my first offence of any kind & I complied with the police throughout the process on the night. I’m extremely remorseful & will be giving up alcohol (infrequent drinker anyway).

My main concern is a custodial sentence, I can manage a driving ban & fortunately work close to home most of the time.

Assuming the blood alcohol level is in line with or lower than the breathalyser reading, how likely is a custodial sentence & are there any steps I can take between now & the court date to minimise the risk?

Thanks

The sentencing guidelines suggest a maximum of a high level community order

Excess Alcohol (drive/attempt to drive) (Revised 2017)

www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk

You will receiving the maximum due to aggravating factors ie accident

 

[ascott1988]

Ok thank you.

 

[Daisybeau]

Ok thank you.

Hiya, if you haven’t already have a good search on the forums with regards to an accident being an aggravated factor. There’s some really experienced members on here who have posted about their own individual cases and they explain more about their readings and the fact that they damaged property etc didn’t affect their sentencing which you would expect it to. No one can say for sure what will happen on the day of sentencing, so all of this advice is potentially what could happen. There is some really good cases where it depends on the magistrates on the day. I personally would hire a local solicitor - don’t go more than £600
And they can help massively, they will represent you in court help with articulating your case and take a massive burden off from a very stressful situation

 

[sighingforlife]

Assuming your bloods come back in the 3rd band (207-275, which matches 90-119 breath band which you were in), though that is really just a guess at this point, the starting point for sentencing would be 23-28 months ban and a community order.

Then the aggravating and mitigating factors will come into play. Some assumptions here as well but it sounds like...

Aggravating:

• Involved in a collision

Mitigating:

• No previous convictions
• Very short journey
• Remorse
• Positive character
• No passengers
• In work/prospect of work
• Assistance to law enforcement (in that you complied etc)
• Early guilty plea

As you can see, there's a lot of things in your favour. Just because you have one aggravating factor, doesn't automatically mean you'll get the highest recommended sentence. I damaged a van, blew 77 at the station, and came out with a 12 month ban, discounted to 9 after driving driving rehab course (now completed), and a fine which represented less than 1 day's pay for me. It was in Scotland so those England & Wales sentencing guidelines don't strictly apply, but basically a decent mitigation was put forwards and I ended up with basically the lowest possible sentence, even with a moderately high reading and damaging a vehicle.

There's no crystal ball here, but it would be pretty exceptional for this to result in going to prison unless you manage to really wind the court up and get done for contempt of court!

 

[ascott1988]

Assuming your bloods come back in the 3rd band (207-275, which matches 90-119 breath band which you were in), though that is really just a guess at this point, the starting point for sentencing would be 23-28 months ban and a community order.

Then the aggravating and mitigating factors will come into play. Some assumptions here as well but it sounds like...

Aggravating:

• Involved in a collision

Mitigating:

• No previous convictions
• Very short journey
• Remorse
• Positive character
• No passengers
• In work/prospect of work
• Assistance to law enforcement (in that you complied etc)
• Early guilty plea

As you can see, there's a lot of things in your favour. Just because you have one aggravating factor, doesn't automatically mean you'll get the highest recommended sentence. I damaged a van, blew 77 at the station, and came out with a 12 month ban, discounted to 9 after driving driving rehab course (now completed), and a fine which represented less than 1 day's pay for me. It was in Scotland so those England & Wales sentencing guidelines don't strictly apply, but basically a decent mitigation was put forwards and I ended up with basically the lowest possible sentence, even with a moderately high reading and damaging a vehicle.

There's no crystal ball here, but it would be pretty exceptional for this to result in going to prison unless you manage to really wind the court up and get done for contempt of court!

Thanks for the response, it’s very reassuring & I certainly won’t be winding the court up!

 

[stu12341234]

Hi

No custodial sentence for you, from what you have stated.

So get that thought out of your mind.

Keep your head up!

Kind regards,




Stu

 

[Xeronema]

Thanks for your help. i was looking for it

Is there anything else we need to know?