Drink driver's ambulance crash

8:30am Tuesday 15th January 2008

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AN uninsured driver who smashed into the back of an ambulance while almost five times the drink drive limit has walked free from court.

Maciej Parzych, 31, of Smallbrook House, Staverton, had been drinking at a party before piling into the back of the emergency vehicle which had stopped at a roundabout at lunchtime.

The ambulance, which had a patient suffering spinal injuries in the back of it, was violently shunted forward by the impact.

Parzych initially denied drink driving but was sent to jail for 150 days after changing his plead before magistrates in Chippenham.

But Judge Douglas Field, sitting with two justices at Swindon crown court, upheld the Pole's appeal and suspended the sentence.

Claire Marlow, prosecuting, told the court ambulanceman Stephen Brown was driving the vehicle on Hammond Way, Trowbridge, at 2pm on Saturday April 14 last year.

As it approached a roundabout the car in front stopped to allow a young couple to cross the road and he pulled up behind it.

She said Mr Brown looked in the mirror and saw a car approaching from behind with the wheels screeching and smoke coming from them.

Before he could do anything the car smashed into the back of the ambulance causing it to lurch forward with some force.

He then saw the driver of the car staggering along the side of the road approaching the window of the ambulance.

She said his speech was slurred and incomprehensible so he told him to wait at the side of the road as the police had already been called.

When they arrived he was found to have 171 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath, the legal limit is 35 micrograms.

He was also found to have no insurance and Miss Marlow said one of the tyres was also defective.

Parzych pleaded guilty to drink driving and having no insurance.

Magistrates jailed him for 150 days and banned him from the road for four years but gave him the chance to reduce it by a year if he completed a rehabilitation course.

Andrew Eddy, defending, said although his client had initially pleaded not guilty a sentence equivalent of five months was too long as the maximum is six months.

He said his client case to the UK three years ago for a better life and sends money home to his family in Poland.

Parzych, he said, worked at a dairy in Shepton Mallet and had been at a party before making the foolish decision to drive a relatively short distance home.

He urged the court to consider prison overcrowding and said it was possible to pass a robust sentence without jailing him.

"This is not a case where the public need to be protected," he told the court.

Suspending the sentence for a year the judge said Parzych would have to do 300 hours of community service and be on probation for a year. He left the ban untouched.