Vic: Driver's 0.345 reading staggers police

AAP General News (Australia)
04-09-2007
Vic: Driver's 0.345 reading staggers police

MELBOURNE, April 9 AAP - A drink driver's weekend blood-alcohol reading of 0.345 is
"staggering", a top Victorian police officer has said.

Another police officer said it was the highest reading he had ever seen.

Assistant Commissioner Noel Ashby said the driver, who was pulled over in Melbourne's
outer east about 4.40pm (AEST) yesterday, may have had about 25-30 alcoholic drinks to
have such a high blood-alcohol level.

Police pulled over the 37-year-old man in Pleasant Drive, Heathmont after receiving
reports of an erratic driver.

He blew 0.345, almost seven times the legal driving limit.

"That is staggering, I can't use any better word," Mr Ashby told Southern Cross Broadcasting.

"How someone in this day and age, with a focus right across the community on drink-driving,
with the cultural shifts that we've made ... when we see the new generation of drivers
coming through, they don't drink and drive anywhere near as much as people used to.

"It is now socially unacceptable to drink and drive and every now and then someone
jumps out with a reading like this guy, 0.345, and it is staggering."

Police were so concerned for the man's welfare yesterday that after breath testing
him, they drove him to Maroondah Hospital for a medical check before driving him home.

Senior Constable Daryl White was another one amazed by the high reading.

"In the 18 years I have been in the police force it was the highest reading I have
ever detected in a living person," Sen Const White said.

Before taking him to hospital, police immediately suspended the man's licence after
further testing him at Ringwood police station.

He will be charged with driving under the influence and other driving offences.

AAP kn/gfr/maur/de

KEYWORD: DRIVER LEAD

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