Suffolk woman banned from driving after refusing road-side drug test
The incident occurred in the early hours of Sunday 24 March
A 26-year-old woman has been banned from driving after refusing a roadside drug wipe and a request to provide a specimen of blood, after her car was seen driving erratically in Forest Heath earlier this year.
Faith McNab-Thompson, of Fennel Drive in Red Lodge, appeared before Ipswich Magistrates’ Court on Friday 7 June, where she was disqualified from driving for three years and ordered to pay costs and charges totalling £199.
McNab-Thompson – who had pleaded guilty to failing to provide a specimen for analysis - was also made subject of a 12-month Community Order, requiring her to undertake rehabilitation activity and was given a three-month curfew requirement, applicable between 8pm and 7am each day.
The incident occurred in the early hours of Sunday 24 March, when police were called regarding the manner of driving of a black Audi A1 in Mildenhall, which had been seen veering across the road, almost hit a traffic island and was driving 30mph in a 60mph zone.
At just after 2.45am the Audi was located by officers driving on the A1065 towards the Fiveways roundabout at Barton Mills. The police car got behind the Audi and its blue lights were illuminated and right indicator activated in order to instruct the driver to pull into the services.
The Audi’s brake lights illuminated, but it then continued past the turning for the services and then entered the A11 towards Thetford. The police car then got alongside the Audi on the dual carriageway in an attempt to get the driver’s attention and instruct them to follow the officers, at which point it came to an abrupt stop in the live carriageway.
The officers then deemed the driver was not fit to continue driving and so had to close one lane of the A11 behind the Audi so they could speak to the driver, who transpired to be McNab-Thompson.
Officers found her to not be fully alert and she took several minutes to exit the vehicle when requested to do so. Her speech was slurred and she was unsteady on her feet.
McNab-Thompson was asked to perform a roadside breath test which she passed, but when the officers then asked her to take a drug test, she refused to do so and was then arrested. She was taken to Bury St Edmunds Police Investigation Centre, where she refused to provide a sample of blood for analysis and was subsequently charged.
PC Georgia Goreham, of the Mildenhall Response Investigation Team, said: “Faith McNab-Thompson was clearly in no fit state to drive and the dangerous manner in which she was handling her car is frightening to think about.
“She was oblivious to our initial requests for her to pull over and to then perform what was essentially an emergency stop on a dual-carriageway was extremely reckless.
“It was fortunate that this was the early hours of the morning with little other traffic around, otherwise someone could have been very seriously injured. I am grateful to the members of the public who reported her driving to us and most likely prevented a nasty collision from occurring.”