A drink driver crashed his girlfriend’s Proton car into a wall and a row of parked vehicles after he drove it against her wishes after he had been drinking.
Leeds Crown Court heard today that Michael James Curtis had gone out to a shop on the evening of December 19 last year but did not return for some three hours.
Bashir Ahmed, prosecuting, said when he did get back to her home his girlfriend could tell he had been drinking and he admitted visiting a friend and having consumed alcohol.
He asked her for the keys to her car. She refused but he took them from her jacket and she heard him start the car outside on the drive in Lawton Street in Primrose Hill.
As he started to reverse it he scraped the car on the garden wall and drove forward again and turned the engine off.
Mr Ahmed said by that time she was already ringing the police and as she was on the phone heard him start the engine again and drive off.
Curtis was spotted by police approaching Newsome Road with no lights on the vehicle although it was around midnight.
They put on their blue lights indicating for him to stop and he did slow down as though he was going to do so but as an officer got out to approach him he drove off at speed.
He reached 60mph in North Road South which had a 30mph limit and in Church Lane overtook a car on the wrong side of the road. He did not stop at the junction with Taylor Hill Road and in Station Lane the car began to slide.
Mr Ahmed said Curtis attempted to brake but lost control and crashed into a garden wall and parked vehicles. The damaged Proton became wedged between the wall and one of those cars and he had to be helped from it.
One of the vehicles which was damaged was a Motability vehicle used by a family to transport their disabled child and the collision caused them inconvenience over Christmas until a replacement could be issued.
Curtis told police he had been drinking and at first not realised the police blue light was aimed at him. When he realised it was he panicked.
Curtis, 20, of Princess Crescent, Dewsbury admitted aggravated vehicle taking, dangerous driving, failing to stop when requested, failing to provide a specimen, not having a full driving licence or insurance.
He was given an eight month prison sentence suspended for two years, with 20 hours rehabilitation requirement focusing on his alcohol consumption, 250 hours unpaid work and disqualified from driving for two years.
Judge Tom Bayliss QC told Curtis: “Only your guilty plea has saved you. You have come within an inch of going to prison today.”
