'Catastrophically drunk' driver said he couldn't get a taxi because he had a horse with him

A “catastrophically drunk” man caught driving claimed he could not get a taxi home because he had a horse with him. Top showjumper Walter Jacob Stewart, 33, a farrier of Coleraine, Northern Ireland, was stopped near Ballymoney by police who waited to pounce after a road user said they suspected a driver had been drinking as a vehicle pulling a horsebox was swerving across one of the country's busiest routes.

The person contacted police to say the vehicle was crossing the middle of the road causing oncoming traffic to take evasive action. A prosecutor told Coleraine Magistrates Court a civilian phoned police at 11.20pm on October 24 to complain about the standard of driving of a vehicle towing a horsebox. Police were waiting near Garryduff Primary School and they saw it come round a corner on the wrong side of the road. After putting on flashing lights and sounding their siren they stopped the vehicle being driven by Stewart who smelt of liquor and was unsteady on his feet.



He had an alcohol/breath reading of 91, with the legal limit being 35. A defence lawyer said her client had been with his brother to buy a showjumping horse and met the people involved in a restaurant but after an argument with his brother, who was meant to have been driving, Stewart “was left with the horse, horsebox and jeep”. She said Stewart was on the way home and thought at the time he was fine to drive and said he would have got a taxi “but for the fact he had a horse in a horsebox”. She claimed a tyre blowout on the horsebox made driving difficult and contributed to the standard of driving.

She said Stewart wished to apologise to the court and the public for his “foolish and stupid actions” and the risk he had put himself and other drivers in. Deputy District Judge Sean O’Hare said Stewart was “catastrophically drunk” and there was no way he should have been anywhere near a vehicle with the amount of alcohol he had consumed. The judge said that with the high alcohol reading and the poor quality of driving his initial reaction was to ban him from driving for two years but with the guilty plea he reduced it to 18 months and said although the ban may have an effect on Stewart’s business “that’s entirely down to you”. The judge added: “It is a very, very high reading and a very bad piece of driving”. Stewart was also fined £500.