Former ‘Ex On The Beach’ ‘contestant’ Scarlett Harrison, 20, was found to be over the legal drink drive limit when she was stopped by police in Manchester city centre after drinking Pink Gins with a friend she fell out with according to an article in the Metro.
When Harrison was taken to the police station she was asked to provide a second, more accurate sample using the evidential breathalyser machine (EBM) but she told officers that her collagen implants made it difficult to get her mouth around the tube.
Whilst reasons not to blow into the EBM are often given by people suspected of drink driving, claiming that your lips are too big is not one we have heard before.
The excuse did not work for Harrison, as if often the case, and she was charged with failing to provide a breath sample which, upon conviction, often gets treated the same as if someone had blew over the limit anyway!
Harrison pleaded guilty on the day her trial was due to start.
The court was told that she pulled over by the police on June 20 in her Mini One in a taxi rank outside Piccadilly train station.
Harrison has now been banned from driving for 16 months and ordered to pay £310 in fines and costs – which is the same sort of sentence that is given out by Magistrates when people DO provide a specimen of breath on the EBM are ARE found to be over the legal limit.
Prosecutor Neil White told the court that:
‘When the officers went over to speak to her, they could smell alcohol on her breath and so conducted a roadside breath test.
‘She was over the limit so she was taken to the police station.
‘At the station, they informed her about going through to the intoximeter room and proceeded to discuss the demeanour of the defendant and how she now felt.
‘She tried to go through with it and attempted to blow four times.
‘She told them she was anxious and nervous and when asked by the police officer if there was any reason why she couldn’t provide a sample, she said her lips were too big and she couldn’t blow into it.
‘They asked if she had any medical conditions or health conditions that could stop her doing so and she said: “No, just my lips”.’
Harrisons lawyer Matthew Wallace said:
‘Along with the current trend, she has collagen implants in her lips which is something that caused her due difficulty in forming a seal around the tube.
‘She was also attacked a number of months ago by a person, and one side of her lip was damaged and has scar tissue which provided her further difficulty.
‘When she was in the intoximeter room, they told her she needed to blow into the machine and she was feeling they were very abrupt.
‘Of course it is their professional duty and she had to blow into the machine, however she became anxious and she did try to give a sample.
‘It was recorded as a failure. It can be either marked as a failure or refusal – but this says nothing about a deliberate refusal. She was trying to provide a sample.’
He added: ‘She is currently out of work, she arrived back from working abroad in Ibiza week ago.
‘She is due to start work at a local restaurant once it opens, she is just awaiting a starting date.’
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