A DRUNK driver binged on 13 pints of lager before making a marathon 120-mile drive from Newcastle to Edinburgh.
Michael Reynolds, who has never even had a driving licence, sunk four cans of lager while he was driven to Newcastle in a car before downing nine pints at a pub in the city's Metro Centre.
He then got behind the wheel and somehow made it to his fl
at in Edinburgh where he began drinking again.
Acting on a tip-off from a member of the public, police arrested him and the 49-year-old admitted he had driven more than 120 miles.
It was his fifth drink driving offence, despite having never passed his test. It also emerged that unemployed Reynolds had no insurance.
Today at Edinburgh Sheriff Court he pled guilty to driving while unfit through drink or drugs.
Fiscal depute Graham Fraser said: "The miraculous thing was that he was able to travel that distance of at least 100 miles."
Mr Fraser told the court how Reynolds had been drinking while he had been a passenger in a van driving down to the Newcastle area.
He said: "As a passenger he drank four cans of lager and went to a pub in the Metro Centre where he drank another nine pints of lager."
When he got back, police turned up at his door over a tip-off.
Initially he would not answer but when he did, they noticed his eyes were glazed and he was unsteady on his feet.
They asked him about the van and he admitted he had driven it from England.
Reynold's solicitor, Jim Stephenson, said his client has a drink problem and had detoxed in June – a month after the drunken journey.
Mr Stephenson said that since the detox, at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, his client had not been drinking.
Sheriff Alistair Noble fined him £315 and banned him from holding or obtaining a licence for three years.
The full article contains 335 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
