Drug driver stopped on A9 through Sutherland is given fine and road ban
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A VAN driver who tested positive for cannabis while behind the wheel on the trunk road through Sutherland, has been fined £320 and banned from the road for a year.
Neil McLeish, Glenburn Road, Paisley, was stopped by police on January 15 on the A9 at Evelix, outside Dornoch.
Roderick Urquhart, prosecuting, told Tain Sheriff Court yesterday: “Officers seem to have been interested in the passenger as much as the accused.
“I do not know if initially both were searched in terms of the Misuse of Drugs Act.
“There was a strong smell of cannabis from the van and from the accused and he was required to provide a specimen, which he did.
“That tested positive and he was arrested and a blood sample was taken.”
Fifty-one-year-old McLeish was found to have 6.6microgrammes of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol ( Delta-9-THC) in a one litre of blood, more than three times above the legal limit of two microgrammes.
Delta-9-THC has been identified as the primary active component of cannabis
McLeish, who is unemployed, previously admitted drug driving by letter.
He was present in the dock at Monday’s court but did not have legal representation.
In his letter he explained that he had consumed a quantity of cannabis, but was not aware that there was now a legal limit above which you could not drive.
Sheriff Gary Aitken told McLeish that it had been an offence to drive while unfit through the consumption of drugs for a long time.
However, the sheriff said that previously it had been difficult to detect drug drivers but technology had moved on to such an extent that there were now reliable tests which showed up the presence of drugs in peoples’ systems.
He told McLeish that drug driving was now on a similar level to drink driving with legal limits set. The penalty was also the same – a minimum disqualification of 12 months.
