A BUS driver was four times over the drink-drive limit as he crashed his vehicle with 10 passengers onboard.
Steven Dawson drove his McGill's coach into the rear of a car in Glasgow's Bridge Street.
Police tracked him down and he was breath tested a short time later after returning to his depot in Barrhead, East Renfrewshire.
He gave a reading of 136 microgrammes per 100ml of breath. The legal limit is 35mg.
Dawson told officers he had started drinking before starting his shift that morning.
Dawson, 52, of Glasgow, was arrested on Friday and held in the cells over the weekend to make a appearance at Paisley Sheriff Court yesterday.
Sheriff David Pender immediately banned him from driving and called for reports to be prepared.
The court was told that Dawson had crashed his bus into a car being driven by Jim Carnwath in the Bridge Street area of the city on March 8.
He had then driven back to the McGill's depot in Muriel Street, Barrhead, where a person who was concerned about what had happened and the strong smell of alcohol from his breath contacted police.
In court, he admitted driving the vehicle in Bridge Street, Glasgow, and Muriel Street, Barrhead, on the day in question while he was almost four times over the legal drink-drive limit.
He had also been charged with driving without due care and attention in Bridge Street, Glasgow, while carrying passengers onboard his bus and colliding with the rear of the other vehicle, causing damage to both.
When he denied that particular charge, the Crown accepted his plea.
Sheriff Pender heard that there had been 10 passengers onboard the bus at the time of the accident.
Depute fiscal Annette Ward said: "One of the other parties detected a strong smell of alcohol from the accused and contacted police.
"When officers spoke to him, he said 'I've made a mistake. I was drinking this morning'."
Defence agent John Gardner said there were underlying issues which required to be addressed.
Sheriff Pender said that before he could begin to consider sentencing options, and due to the serious nature of the charge, he would require a detailed background profile.
Deferring sentence until April 8 and calling for reports to be prepared, he imposed interim disqualification and released the accused on bail.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article