slicksterjam

My mate Sunday night had been out all day with his children and returning them home spoke to one of our other friends who was in the local, he agreed to visit them and give a lift to one of their sisters home, while talking and waiting he drank 3 pints of lager shandy, on leaving the pub he was part of routine checks on the adjacent road of which part of the check is a breath test neither he nor the officers thought he was over the limit at which point the breathalyser flashed red, he was taken to the local police station where it was discovered he was 5mg over the limit, after a 3 hour spell in the police station he was breathalysed again which he passed and was taken to his vehicle to drive it home and appear in court this Friday, Is this explainable in any way and is it worth him appealing or will the law just see it as he was over end of story. (He doesn't normally go out much at all I would say about once a month for a drink)

SteveScooby

iTrader: (2)

Limit is 35 micrograms of alcohol in 100ml of breath.

He blew more than that, he's gonna get banned, end of

Spec'c'57

iTrader: (1)

Have to agree.... Over the limit is over.... ban it will be for 1 year...

I will NEVER drink more than 1 pint if driving.....

island991

if you drink and drive. you should get caught and banned.

no excuse. no sympathy.

Jerome

The fact that he only had 1.5 pints will not prevent him from getting banned. He can use it as some form of mitigation to prevent a longer than a year ban.

There are so many variables to calculating your limit it is best to not drink at all if you are driving.

Spoon

3 pints is either a fairly long wait or he's a fish! Shandy with strong lager drank quickly will, as has happened, see him over the limit.

I can't see any reason why he should feel unlucky except he didn't cause an accident on the way home.

Moley

iTrader: (9)

He'll probably get a 12 month ban, with the option to take a drink drive/road safety course reducing the ban to 9 months.

Chip Sengravy

If I was in court, and wearing the judicial wig, I'd give him 20yrs; 19 with good behaviour and taking it dry up the marmite mine off Mr Big who's in with the warders, just for drinking shandy.

The fact he was over the limit is irrellevant in this case.

Fuzz

I got breathalised after 2 pints of Fosters a few years back, it started to glow red but wasn't a full on bright LED.. he said, go home now and don't go out in the car again until tomorrow.

Despite my lucky escape I would have thought if it went red then I would have been carted down to the station and a BLOOD SAMPLE TAKEN for accuracy and recordability!

Did your mate have blood taken or was it all done on the breath test??
Sounds rather strange if it was just done on breath alone.

Andy

Brun

I have a pint at best, never more - even a half. If i blow red off that, then i will take what's coming to me. Your mate has played the game and lost. He should accept the consequences!

slicksterjam

Thanks for the replies, it is as I thought with the over the limit so a definite ban just thought I would ask as a ban will affect his work

he took a blood test which resulted in the 5mg over result but soon returned to normal

Chip Sengravy

All that hassle for 5 thousandths of a gram . If you are going to get done for D&D, at least get out of the figures after the > . <

evogt

If you drink any form of alcohol and then get into a car you should be banned for life. I lost a family member due to a ****ing drunk driver. It should be banned completely, even drinking shandy and dont give a **** if pubs go out of business if no one can drive to them. If the pub in question never served the tosser that killed my relative then they still might be alive.

OllyK

Not necessarily, and that's partly the problem. Much depends if you have eaten and your metabolism. I was stopped in my younger days after 3 pints of stella and got the amber light, and was sent on my way. These days if I drink, the misses drives

Spoon

In this case, whatever the details, he was over.

My mate once ate 4 big bags of liquorice and never shat himself either.

SiDHEaD

If he failed but then passed at the station on the better machine why is he being done? That happened to my friend at work and he was fine to go.

Chip Sengravy

You can't quantify consumption to a safe amount by volume alone

That Mark Almond bloke put himself in hospital after just 1 pint

Spoon

But he did take it through a straw or two.

douglasb

As I read it, he failed the breath test at the police station as well. He was then tested after a further 3 hours and was under the limit then so he was allowed to drive at that time.

Chip Sengravy

There's the trouble.....went straight to his head !

boomer

Well according to "The Traffic Officer's Companion" (10th Edition), if you "blow" less than 50 microgrammes (ug) of alcohol in 100millilitres (ml) breath (in the lower of the two samples taken) you can elect to take a blood or urine sample (and the breath sample is not used).

This might take some time, as a believe that a doctor must take the blood, giving you a little more leeway.

Also, afaiaa, the police won't actually prosecute unless you are over 40ug per 100ml.

If he was only 5ug over the 35ug limit, then that is very borderline

Presumably all these rules were clearly explained to your mate?

mb

Puff The Magic Wagon!

iTrader: (2)

I might drink a shandy before I drive home sometimes but I make damn sure that the ratio of lemonade to fosters/carlsberg whatever is higher. Tendency for publicans and bar-staff to give you 2/3 pint of lager to 1/3 lemonade, which with the 3 taken above would put you over 2 pints. Pint glasses are hard to judge amounts without the 1/2 pint line.

I refer to my shandies as lemonade tops!

lightwave693

im thinking he might be lucky with passing on the second test, as it shows there was a very small amount over the limit in his blood. its like you can drink 5pints in 20mins, drive, get caught and pass the roadside test, but if you drive 60mins after the 5pints and get a roadside test you will fail.

i did a course once on drink driving and they say that an average bloke absorbs 1 unit of alc every 20mins, and the body gets rid of it at 1unit an hour... its easy to work out, legal limit is five units.

Spoon

You misheard it. He went straight for the head.

OllyK

I don't disagree, my point was, you can say that X pints is safe, many other factors to take in to account.

OllyK

Yeah but who's "average" on here?

hades

Average means pretty much nothing. I know of people who have been breathalised an hour after drinking 4 pints and passed, and others who've failed on a pint and a half. There's an awful lot of factors involved and they vary from person to person, that's just life.

Got to admit I've personally never seen the point of drinking until you know you're gonig to be marginal. You won't get the benefits (not associated with driving) of actually being mildly drunk, and yet you're still taking the risk - and that risk is living with injuring/killing someone (even if you didn't directly cause the crash) as well as just being arrested. Personally when I drive when I go out, I'll often have but always limit myself to one pint of <4% type beer at the start of the night, knowing that when I leave 3 hours later it'll be pretty much completely out of the system.

Jerome

Obviously you have some strong feelings about D&D, and for good reason.

However, I don't think life bans achieve anything. Do you really think banning an 18 year old caught for drink driving for life is a fair penalty when they haven't had an accident and are just over the limit? I suspect I know your answer.

Furthermore, how is a pub supposed to know who is driving anyway?

matty01

quote:

My mate Sunday night had been out all day with his children and returning them home spoke to one of our other friends who was in the local, he agreed to visit them and give a lift to one of their sisters home, while talking and waiting he drank 3 pints of lager shandy, on leaving the pub he was part of routine checks on the adjacent road of which part of the check is a breath test neither he nor the officers thought he was over the limit at which point the breathalyser flashed red, he was taken to the local police station where it was discovered he was 5mg over the limit, after a 3 hour spell in the police station he was breathalysed again which he passed and was taken to his vehicle to drive it home and appear in court this Friday, Is this explainable in any way and is it worth him appealing or will the law just see it as he was over end of story. (He doesn't normally go out much at all I would say about once a month for a drink)

/quote


That's **** all mate,someone i heard of bought a second hand airifle and was caught shooting on farmers land , no big deal you might think , BUT the rifle was tested for power at the cop shop and found to be 12.29 lbft , the limit bieng 12.00 ftlb this guy is now 2 years into a mandatory 5 year stretch for trespass with a class 1 firearm , now THAT sucks , BIG TIME

slicksterjam

The 2nd breath test was 3 hours after being charged with drink driving to see if he was ok to be dropped off at his car to return it home, I just asked the question on here as their is alot of guilty feelings from the other mate who asked him to give his sister a lift home and while waiting and talking etc he consumed what he calculated as 3x 1/2 pint lager plus 3 x 1/2 pint lemonade
I just wondered if it would be worth him contacting a solicitor or just to accept his punishment and not to annoy the magistrate on pleading against what is a black and white case.

thanks for everyone's input and marc almond