A woman with no car insurance has been banned from the road for 15 months after cramming eight people into her car and driving 50 miles whilst more than twice over the drink drive limit.
Five of the passengers were children and 34-year-old Margaret Donaldson pleaded leniency, claiming she had been forced to flee home urgently after violent threats from her husband. However, she accepted she had no defence of driving by necessity because she had travelled such a distance before police stopped her.
After pleading guilty to drink-driving, overloading a vehicle and driving with no motor insurance, Perth Sheriff Court heard that the mother from Crieff had children aged two, seven, twelve, fourteen and fifteen in the car when she was stopped.
Defending, solicitor Cheryl Clark said, "Due to a history of threatening and violent behaviour in the marriage she took the threats from her husband seriously."
"She left home as quickly as possible and got into the car and drove off."
Sheriff Lindsay Foulis, presiding over the case, refused to show mercy to Mrs Donaldson, however, and in addition to the fifteen month ban she was ordered to pay fines totalling £250.
Craig Handy, spokesman for CoverGirl Car Insurance Services, specialists in women's car insurance, heard about Donaldson's case and said, "Whatever her reasons were for driving, with an endorsed licence she's now going to find it tough to get a cheap car insurance deal."