Crail drink-driver recorded ‘highest reading’ sheriff has ever seen

A Fife drink-driver has been spared jail despite recording the “highest reading” a sheriff has ever seen.

Richard Farrer was nearly six times over the limit when he was stopped in his elderly mother’s car on St Andrews Road, Crail, on October 31 last year.

At Cupar Sheriff Court today, Farrer, 43, of Bowbutts, Crail, admitted the offence.

The court heard he had 192 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath one of the highest readings ever recorded in Scotland. The limit is 35.

Sheriff Macnair said: “You got behind the wheel of a motor car with so much alcohol in your breath that you gave a reading of 192 microgrammes, which is over five times the legal limit.

“That is the highest I have ever seen and is completely inexcusable.”

Sheriff Macnair added he was “only just” persuaded to impose a community payback order over a custodial sentence because Farrer was a first offender and because of his early guilty plea.

The sheriff placed him on 18 months’ supervision and ordered him to carry out 300 hours of unpaid work in the community to be completed within nine months.

He also banned him from driving for 32 months.