Jail for trucker caught drink driving wrong way down Peterborough parkway

Cristian Murariu (49) from Romania was three times over the drink drive limit as he drove down the Frank Perkins Parkway at about 1am on Saturday.

He was driving at about 5mph when his fellow lorry driver came across him driving towards him in the pitch black.

The second driver was able to open the cab door and apply the air brake to bring the HGV safely to a stop.

Yesterday (Monday) Murariu was jailed for 12 weeks and banned from driving for two years after pleading guilty to dangerous driving and drink driving.

Magistrate David Belcher, sentencing, said: “Dangerous driving is the most serious charge. There are many aggravating features in this case. It was at night, so it was harder to see. You were driving a HGV, you were three times over the drink drive limit, and you were putting people in risk of injury.

”No drivers were expecting someone to be coming the wrong way down a dual carriageway- there is the risk of serious injury or even death.”

Giles Beaumont, prosecuting, told the court after the lorry driver had stopped Murariu’s lorry, he smelt alcohol on his breath. A taxi driver, who had also stopped called police.

Murariu was arrested and when he arrived at Thorpe Wood Police Station he gave a reading of 110 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 ml of great - the limit is 35 microgrammes.

Bal Dhaliwal, defending, said Murariu had pulled up in ‘a secluded spot’ in Peterborough after driving from Scotland on Saturday afternoon. She said he had not been planning to drive again until Monday, and had bought food and alcohol.

But later that night a security guard had told him to move on - and not speaking English, Murariu was unable to say he was intoxicated. Miss Dhaliwal said ‘the security guard would not take no for an answer.’

Miss Dhaliwal said Murariu did not realise he was on a public road as it was so quiet.

Analysis of the tachograph showed Murariu was on the road for six minutes before he was stopped.

the court heard he had been a lorry driver had been a trucker for 20 years and had no previous convictions in either his homeland or the UK.

Murariu will have to take an extended retest before he gets his license back.

He was also ordered to pay a £115 victim surcharge upon his release.