A 62-year-old woman has been warned she could face prison after she drove to the shops for cat food while nearly five times the drink-drive limit.
Julie McNee was pulled over by police as she swerved along a Kinross-shire road in February.
Ten years earlier, she was caught drink-driving through Auchterarder while reeking of booze and wearing a party hat.
McNee, of High Cleuch, Glendevon, appeared at Perth Sheriff Court and admitted driving a Suzuki Grand Vitara on the A823 Yetts O’Muchart to Gleneagles road, with 105 mics of alcohol in her system.
Sheriff Gillian Wade told her: “This is a very concerning case.”
Police tipped off
Fiscal depute Elizabeth Hodgson told the court: “At around 2.30pm, police officers received information regarding the accused’s vehicle.
“The accused’s details were also given to police.”
Ms Hodgson said: “Police traced the vehicle at about 3.15pm, travelling northbound on the A923 near the Castlehill Reservoir.
“Officers followed the car, which was seen to weave over the road and go on to the grass verge.
“The vehicle was stopped and the accused was spoken to.
“At the time her eyes were wide and her speech was slurred.”
McNee was arrested after failing a roadside breath test.
Solicitor Pauline Cullerton, defending, confirmed her client had a “directly analogous” offence from 2012.
“Ms McNee had been in a lot of pain the previous evening,” she said.
“She tells me she had consumed alcohol that night and didn’t stopped drinking until about 5am.
“She had no plans to go out that day but in the afternoon she needed to go to the supermarket to get cat food.”
Car broke down
The court heard McNee no longer had her car.
She said it “broke down” before she received an interim driving ban at a previous court hearing in September.
Sheriff Gillian Wade told McNee: “A financial penalty for an offence of this nature is not appropriate.
“So I am left with not much of an alternative to custody.
“But there are clearly significant issues here that need to be addressed.”
Sentence was deferred until December 21 for a further background report.
In 2012, McNee was banned from the road for two years and ordered to carry out unpaid work after she was caught driving down Auchterarder High Street while almost four times the limit.
At the time, McNee claimed she was drinking to deal with the stress of her job as a housekeeper, having been blamed by her then manager after a sausage was found in bed linen.
