Carlisle drug driver’s three-year ban will be ‘significant penalty’, court told

A motorist caught drug driving in Carlisle “some days” after taking cocaine has been handed a lengthy ban.

Christopher John McLaughlin, 33, hadn’t realised until he arrived at the city’s magistrates’ today that he would receive a three-year disqualification for committing his second motoring offence inside 10 years. “I’ve lost my job for that now,” said McLaughlin, of Bower Street, Carlisle, while being sentenced.

Magistrates heard it was around 5.20pm, on August 26 2021, when a police officer saw his Mercedes box van on the city’s Eastern Way. It was “swerving and wandering” in the lane, and was stopped at Harraby Grove.

A drug wipe test proved positive and it emerged McLaughlin had more than six times the legal limit for a cocaine breakdown product in his bloodstream. He admitted a drug driving charge which duty solicitor, Steven Marsh, accepted would trigger a long driving ban which would be a “significant penalty” for the defendant.

Usually, a court would consider a disqualification starting from 12 months for a stand-alone offence. But because McLaughlin had a previous conviction for drink-driving and had been given a ban within the last 10 years, magistrates had a mandatory three-year starting point for the latest law break.

Last August, McLaughlin had been going through a difficult time after a long-term relationship broke down, and as a result, was using illegal drugs, said Mr Marsh. He had taken cocaine “some days before” being stopped but, added the lawyer: “He didn’t think for one moment that would still be in his system.”

In addition to the driving ban, McLaughlin — employed in the civil engineering industry — received a 12-month community order comprising 60 hours’ unpaid work.