JAIL RISK: An unaccompanied L-plate driver has been warned not to get behind the wheel of a car.
An L-plater who repeatedly failed a breath analysis can expect to go to jail if she gets behind the wheel of a car while completing a Traffic Offender’s Program, a magistrate told Maitland Local Court yesterday.
The court heard Danica Marie-Ann Lightfoot, of Endeavour Street, Rutherford, was stopped on High Street near the intersection of Lee Street on July 7 about 1.50am.
Moments earlier police on High Street saw a Ford Falcon travelling at speed along Ken Tubman Drive.
Lightfoot, told police she was an L-plater but was unable to produce her licence.
She didn’t answer police when they asked her how fast she was travelling along the sign-posted 50km/h High Street.
Lightfoot, 20, returned a positive roadside breath test
and was taken to Maitland police station where she underwent a breath analysis 15 minutes later.
When that test failed she was issued another but it failed because of insufficient breath sample.
A third and final test failed again because Lightfoot failed to provide an insufficient breath sample.
She declined the offer of a doctor and a blood sample was not taken.
During an interview, Lightfoot told police she drank between six and eight glasses of beer and premixed bourbon drinks at the Kandy Bar Hotel in Maitland between 8.30pm and 12.30pm.
In court yesterday, Lightfoot’s solicitor said his client had since sold her car.
Lightfoot pleaded guilty to failing to undergo breath analysis and driving as an unaccompanied learner. She did not entered pleas to driving while suspended on July 19.
“You’re staring down the barrel of time in jail,” magistrate John Chicken said.
“If you want to go to jail all you need to do is drive a car.”
Lightfoot was ordered to attend the Traffic Offender’s Program.
The matter was adjourned to October 8.
