Man fined, banned from driving after impaired incident
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 15/04/2022 (1428 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
A man who backed into a police cruiser while driving with a blood-alcohol level over the legal limit was warned of the dangers and fined Thursday morning.
Brendan Trelford, 21, pleaded guilty to driving with a blood-alcohol level over .08 in Brandon provincial court.
“People are being hurt and killed by drunk drivers across the country, still, despite pretty significant penalties for this offence. You’re really lucky you didn’t hurt yourself or that police officer or anybody else,” Judge Shauna Hewitt-Michta said while sentencing him.
“I hope it plays over and over in your head because that’s part of learning from it and making sure it doesn’t happen again.”
On Sept. 2, 2021, at approximately 1 a.m., a police officer who was stopped at the intersection of 18th Street and Maryland Avenue heard car tires “screeching” while sitting at a red light, said Crown attorney Jonathan Mays.
The vehicle turned onto Maryland Avenue and the officer followed with emergency lights and sirens on, eventually pulling it over.
The officer pulled in behind the vehicle, but it kept backing up until it “bumped into” the police cruiser, which Mays said showed a “poor command” of the vehicle by the driver. There was no serious damage to the cruiser.
Based on the “poor driving,” Mays said the officer was concerned the driver could be intoxicated.
Trelford gave two breath samples, 230 and 220 milligrams of alcohol per 100 milliliters of blood. The legal limit in Manitoba is 80 milligrams.
Mays recommended a $3,000 fine and an 18-month driving ban.
Defence lawyer Bob Harrison said that level of drinking is not normal for Trelford and he was dealing with a death in his family at the time, resulting in poor judgment.
Trelford hasn’t drank since the incident and has taken counselling.
“He treats the matter very seriously … he made a mistake,” Harrison said.
Harrison recommended a $2,500 fine and a driving ban.
Speaking to the court, Trelford apologized for the incident and said he wants to move forward.
Hewitt-Michta said his driving was “terrible” and warned him that a second conviction for the same thing would mean a mandatory jail sentence.
“Normally, a person’s drinking pattern and amount and all that is a personal matter, but when you get yourself up to 230 milligrams per cent and head out driving in the community, then it becomes everybody’s business,” she said.
She sentenced him to a $2,500 fine and a 15-month ban from driving.
» dmay@brandonsun.com
» Twitter: @DrewMay_