2 women injured, drunk driver jailed for 17 months

A SAN FERNANDO man will spend the next 17 months in jail for drunk driving, having injured two women seconds after he drove away from a bar.

Dennis Brown, 53, of Independence Avenue, was sentenced this morning by magistrate Lisa Singh-Phillip in the San Fernando Magistrates' Court.

On July 2, he pleaded guilty to having an alcohol reading of 105 micrograms per 100 millilitres of breath. Singh-Phillip remanded Brown into custody for sentencing today, having regard to a previous charge of driving under the influence charge in 2011, when a magistrate slapped him with a fine.

Court prosecutor Sgt Vernon Saunders said that at about 12.30 am on June 29, PC Alex Mohammed responded to a traffic accident on Pond Street, La Romaine.

Saunders said Mohammed administered a breathalyser test and told Brown of his rights.

The driver replied, "Officer, I over-drink and look wha' going on with me – I bounce down two people."

The two women, Pricilla Vanessa Day and Makesha Edna Sparkle Bunsee, were injured.

Reading an impact statement from the victims, Mohammed told Singh-Philli Day said she was liming at a bar when a man slammed into her car at full speed. The impact flung her into the neighbour's yard.

"I landed on my back. I felt my chest was crushed," Mohammed quoted.

Bunsee, Mohammed said, complained that a man had bounced Day's car, which pitched her into the Western Saloon Bar.

"I was unconscioius and I woke up in the hospital. I suffered injuries to my stomach," Mohammed read from the statement.

In mitigation, Brown admitted to Singh that he was dependent on alcohol, but said since the incident, he has been making great strides to rehabilitate himself.

The magistrate ordered him to serve the term with hard labour.