A man caught drink driving while moving his new ute off a main street, was fined $880 and disqualified for three months to be followed by a 12-month interlock period.
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Blake James Croft, aged 22, of Flirtation Avenue, Mudgee, pleaded guilty to the charge of 'Drive with middle range PCA (Prescribed Concentration of Alcohol)'.
At about 2.40am on Sunday, May 5, 2019, police were patrolling the Mudgee CBD when they spotted Croft's vehicle drive away from the front of a pub.
They followed it into Byron Place and spoke with him after he stopped.
He admitted "yeah, I've had a few" and returned a positive roadside breath test, before being taken to Mudgee Police Station where a breath analysis of 0.095 was recorded.
Croft's solicitor, Tracy Jackson, said that her client had only recently bought the ute he was driving during the incident and was moving it to location that he believed would be safer to leave it.
Magistrate David Day said that while the defendant did the wrong thing by drinking and driving, he understood his concern.
"He was moving the vehicle a short distance because he was worried about it and for good reason, in Mudgee it's common for parts such as light-bars to be taken," he said.
The NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research's latest report - released earlier this month - showed that in the Mid-Western local government area for the 12 months to March 2019, the category that saw the biggest percentage increase was the number of motor vehicle thefts.
However, the number of steal from motor vehicle reports declined by 30.0 per cent, down from 100 cases to 70 during the 12-month period.
