Mum who crashed while six times over limit after cocaine binge is spared jail

A mum who flipped her car onto its roof while more than six times over the limit was given the ‘benefit of the doubt’ and spared jail.

Claire Toland lost control of the vehicle as she swerved to avoid a driver heading towards her on March 23 last year, she claims.

The 43-year-old ended up hitting the pavement which flipped her Peugeot 206 before it continued to slide down the street, hit a sign and then plough into the wall of a house.

Toland called the police and waited for them at the scene, on Longford Road West, in Stockport, where she failed a drug test and was taken into custody.

She was more than six times over the legal limit when tested for Benzoylecgonine (BZE) – the main metabolite of cocaine – and one microgram above the legal limit for the Class A drug itself.

Toland admitted drug driving but insisted she did not feel ‘under the influence’ at the time of the accident because she had done cocaine a few days before and believed it was out of her system.

Her defence lawyer, Terry Maddocks, told Stockport Magistrates Court her client was ‘going through a particularly difficult time when the offence took place’.

He said: ‘She was suffering from a bereavement following the loss of her mother and is a single parent who is carer for her 11-year-old son, who has been diagnosed with severe autism.

‘She became friendly with a quite heavy cocaine user and began using cocaine which she said eased the symptoms of depression and enabled her to socialise.

‘She had not taken cocaine on the day of the accident and indeed the reading for that is only one microgram over the limit of 10 micrograms. There only needs to be a small amount of cocaine to fall foul of that.

‘It is also accepted that BZE does not cause impairment at all. In fact the test for BZE is only because cocaine breaks down quite quickly so the BZE test means drug drivers won’t fall through the detection net.’

Toland, from Withington, Manchester, was banned from driving for 12 months and ordered to pay £134 in costs and victim surcharge.

Mr Maddocks explained that Toland would struggle with this driving ban, as she usually drives her 11-year-old son and two other children aged two and six to school.

He added: ‘She did not think she was over the limit and she did not feel that she was impaired by the use of cocaine. She felt it was solely because she had to take evasive action.’

Magistrate Larry Collier told her: ‘Your solicitor explained that you were simply avoiding the other vehicle.

‘Whether your senses were impaired by what substance you took we will never know but we are giving you the benefit of the doubt.’

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