A drunk driver led police on a chase at up to 70mph through housing estates. Peter Jason Lee, 48, was only stopped by a stinger device which even halted a pursuing police car, with other patrol cars taking over.
He was captured when the long chase through Llanddulas and Betws-yn-Rhos in Conwy ended in Ronald Avenue in Llandudno Junction. A judge at Caernarfon Crown Court today jailed him for 14 months for dangerous driving and a further month for being drunk in charge of a vehicle on a separate occasion.
Lee, of Fifth Avenue, Talacre, Flintshire, was also banned from driving for five years plus the 32 weeks he is expected to serve in prison. Prosecutor Amy Edwards told how a member of the public had reported seeing a car stationery for almost two hours on October 16 last year.
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Police reached the Toyota Yaris at 2.41am and found the engine running, the lights on and music playing. Lee was asleep at the wheel and an officer had to wake him up.
He was breath tested and gave a reading of 93 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath, the legal limit being 35 micrograms.
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But just eight days later on October 24, a police officer spotted a suspicious Seat Ibiza car in Llanddulas and chased it. The driver - who turned out to be Lee again - drove at 70mph in housing estates.
They went through Betws-yn-Rhos and as he approached the Black Cat roundabout in Llandudno Junction the officer asked colleagues on the radio to deploy a stinger device. They did so and it deflated Lee's tyres but did the same for the officer's patrol car.
Other officers took up the chase until it ended in nearby Ronald Avenue. They smelt alcohol and Lee was handcuffed.
In a breath test Lee gave a reading of 87 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath this time. He gave no comment answers in a police interview.
Lionel Greig (corr), defending, said his client had lost his mother, had a significant financial order against his business and had turned to alcohol. He knows at the age of 48 this is not the example he should be setting to his family and he is embarrassed and ashamed.
The judge His Honour Timothy Petts told Lee: "You seem to lose self-control and consequential thinking" once he drinks. Only immediate custody would do.
