A drink-driving Banchory pensioner who was so out of it she didn’t even spot the blue lights of a tailing police car has been banned from driving for a second time.
Angela Gray, 76, was spotted swerving across both lanes on South Deeside Road near Banchory and had a partially drunk bottle of vodka in the footwell of her car.
Aberdeen Sheriff Court was told Gray has been battling alcoholism for the last 20 years and had relapsed.
Fiscal depute Georgia Laird told Aberdeen Sheriff Court that at around 2pm on May 6 this year witnesses observed Gray “swerving over the carriageway” on South Deeside Road, near to West Balbridie.
Concerned there would be a collision they called the police, who also appeared and saw the car “swerving over the central line”.
‘Oblivious to the police presence’
“She then didn’t react to the emergency equipment on the police vehicle behind her,” the fiscal said. “As such, they drove alongside her to identify the driver.
“She still didn’t react and was oblivious to the police presence. It was clear she was not going to stop.”
Officers overtook her and slowed to a halt causing Gray to finally do the same.
“She said she hadn’t been aware of the police presence,” the court was told. “A partially drunk bottle of vodka was found in the passenger footwell.”
Gray admitted driving with 71mcg of alcohol in 100ml of breath, the legal limit being 22.
Angela Gray had a troubled relationship with alcohol
Her defence agent Iain Woodward-Nutt said his client had suffered a 20-year battle with alcohol misuse and a month before this incident had completed a six-week residential rehab course and remained abstinent.
“She had been attending AA meetings seven days a week and also seeing a councillor weekly on top of that,” the solicitor said.
“She was approaching the anniversary of her husband’s death and was about to move into a retirement community which she was anxious about.
“It’s against that background that she suffered an overwhelming urge to drink alcohol.
“Unfortunately she did, and then she drove.”
Sheriff Rory Bannerman heard she had a previous conviction for drink-driving.
Endangered lives of others
He told her: “It’s unfortunate that at this age you find yourself in trouble with the law repeating the same offence from seven years ago.
“It’s members of the public you endangered. It’s a serious offence.”
Gray, of Waters of Feugh, Banchory, was fined £840 and banned from the road for 32 months.
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