Depute fiscal's career in tatters after ban for drink driving

The court heard the "highly-regarded" lawyer's career lies in tatters after she was caught driving while three times the limit and crashing into an oncoming car.

Bates, based at Perth procurator-fiscal office, was disqualified from driving for three years yesterday and fined 630 after officers found her to have 119 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath.

She was yesterday suspended from her post at the Crown Office and could lose her top job following the incident on Wednesday night.

Procurator-fiscal Catriona Dalrymple told Dundee Sheriff Court that at about 9:40pm on Wednesday, Bates was driving along Arbroath Road in Dundee. "She veered to the off side and crossed the centre line to collide with a Renault Scenic driving in the opposite direction."

Emergency services attended. When police officers asked Bates who was driving, she replied: "I was driving, don't worry."

The fiscal said: "When police officers were speaking to the accused, they detected a smell of alcohol on her breath."

Bates, of Dundee, pleaded guilty to one charge of drink driving and to a charge of careless driving that "caused damage to both vehicles and injury" to a passenger in the oncoming car.

The passenger suffered a dislocated little finger on her right hand, which was treated at hospital in Dundee.

Sheriff Linda Smith disqualified Bates for three years "in view of the high reading" and fined her 430 for drink-driving and 200 for careless driving.

She told a visibly distraught Bates: "You don't need me to tell you the seriousness of your reading and the circumstances you found yourself in and the consequences this will have for you."

Her solicitor George Donnelly told the court that Bates had decided to travel from one friend's home to another and "cannot explain why she took her motor vehicle".

Mr Donnelly said: "This has terrible consequences, because this will have a catastrophic effect on her career in her chosen profession. She works with the Crown Office and procurator-fiscal service, but following these proceedings she will be suspended until disciplinary matters are carried out."

In January, another Tayside fiscal, Anne Hart, 39, was banned from driving for 18 months after she admitted smashing into a parked car while drunk at the wheel.