Pair handed driving bans

TWO MEN were banned from the road for alcohol-related offences when they appeared at Lerwick Sheriff Court on Wednesday.

Raymond Tulloch, 53, of Fjallberg, Lerwick, was found waiting at the Bressay Ferry Terminal in Lerwick sitting in the driver’s seat with the key in the ignition of his car on 10 March.

He had 135 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath – around six times over the legal limit of 22 microgrammes.

Sheriff Philip Mann said Tulloch had been “a substantial excess” above the permitted level of alcohol and “amply merited” a period of disqualification. He banned him for 20 months, reduced from 30 months to reflect his early plea of guilty, and fined him £600.

Meanwhile George Rennie, 56, of Houlland Cottage, Sandwick, has been disqualified from holding a licence for one year.

He was stopped by police, who were acting on intelligence, driving a car at Veester Hill and an unclassified road running through Sandwick.

Rennie failed a roadside screening test and was found to have 36 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath.

Sheriff Mann fined Rennie £400 and told him he could cut his ban by three months if he completes a drink driver’s rehabilitation course.

A fine of £250 was handed out to an electrical engineer who admitted speeding on the A970 between the South Laxfirth and Vatster junctions on 5 December last year.

Fergal O’Connor, 23, of the Bibby Challenge vessel in Scalloway Harbour, admitted driving at 76mph contrary to various speed limits in a transit van which is not supposed to be driven at speeds higher than 50mph.

The offence was committed at around 5.45am and, although the roads were clear and the weather was fine, defence agent Tommy Allan said O’Connor accepted he was driving faster than he should have been.