Case Study: Driving whilst under the influence of alcohol

We successfully defended a client at St Helens Magistrates’ Court recently for an offence of driving a motor vehicle after consuming so much alcohol that the proportion in blood exceeded 80 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood in a case that raised some interesting points.

Normally a specimen of breath would be taken and relied on to show that someone was over the limit but if the breath reading is between 40 and 50 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath there is a statutory option to substitute the breath sample with one of blood, or under certain circumstances, urine. The police have to make the detainee aware of this entitlement and do so by quoting the relevant section of a long and complicated form that is filled in at the time that the procedure is being conducted.

There are certain other times when blood can be requested as a statutory requirement as opposed to an option and on this particular occasion, the officer administering the test read the wrong section of the form, wrongly making the request for blood a requirement as opposed to and option. The detainee duly gave a sample of blood that was analysed and shown to be over the limit. We successfully argued that this evidence was inadmissible as the wrong procedure had been followed and the Crown prosecution Service eventually agreed with our argument and discontinued the case.

It’s always worth checking that the correct procedure has been followed in these sort of cases as failure to do so could result in the whole procedure being fatally flawed and result in an acquittal.

David Achilles
Partner

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