A man who hurled racist abuse at an Inverness bed and breakfast owner before running him down with his car in a drunken attack has been jailed.
Steven Douglas was three times the drink-drive limit when he got behind the wheel following an altercation, during which he had made racist remarks and threats towards the business owners.
He rammed another vehicle causing £6,400 of damage and then used his vehicle as “a weapon” to knock down the guesthouse proprietor.
Douglas, 26, appeared at Inverness Sheriff Court for sentencing having previously admitted charges of racially aggravated threatening behaviour and assault to injury and danger of life.
He also pled guilty to drink-driving and dangerous driving.
The charges detailed how, on November 10 of last year, Douglas behaved in a threatening or abusive manner when he shouted, swore and repeatedly uttered racial remarks towards the owners of the accommodation on Culduthel Road, Inverness.
He also made threats towards them.
Drink-driver Steven Douglas almost hit police car
The 26-year-old also drove dangerously in a white Ford van by repeatedly colliding with a vehicle at the address and damaging it, as well as reversing onto a main road, almost colliding with an unmarked police vehicle, and driving off with no lights.
All of this happened while Douglas was under the influence of alcohol.
He also used the van to assault the owner of the B&B by driving at him, striking him on the body and causing him to fall to the ground to his injury and danger of life.
Douglas admitted a drink-driving charge after subsequent breath testing revealed that he had 66 microgrammes of alcohol per 100 millilitres of breath – three times the legal limit of 22 microgrammes.
Solicitor Marc Dickson, for Douglas, said his client, a self-employed subcontractor, had travelled to the area with colleagues for work.
He said: “It seems they had completed their work. They all had gone out in the evening for something to drink.
Racist driver was ‘hopelessly drunk’
“Mr. Douglas had got hopelessly drunk.”
He said Douglas had “little by way of recollection of the way he behaved and is appalled by the way he behaved. It was an appalling course of behaviour”.
“He wants me to take what is a very public opportunity to apologise to the individuals,” Mr Dickson said, adding that his client was “genuine in his remorse”.
But Sheriff Eilidh MacDonald told Douglas, of Pentland Place, Kirkcaldy: “You got drunk. You were three times the drink-drive limit. You deliberately got in your car and drove it repeatedly at another vehicle.
“You then subjected the owners of the bed and breakfast where you were staying to appalling racial abuse.
“You then used your vehicle as a weapon, driving it at somebody, striking them, causing them injury and the danger to their life.
“There is no alternative but to impose a custodial sentence.”
She jailed Douglas for 58 weeks and banned him from the roads for two years, after which he will need to sit and pass an extended test before being allowed to drive.
