A Sarnia police officer pulled over the white Dodge pickup after noticing the truck swerving on Confederation Street.
A Sarnia police officer pulled over the white Dodge pickup after noticing the truck swerving on Confederation Street.
“Before the officer could exit his vehicle, the driver’s door of the truck swung open and Mr. Fortey stumbled out, almost falling over,” assistant Crown attorney Meaghan Jones said Tuesday while reading an agreed statement of facts in a Sarnia courtroom.
The officer could smell alcohol on Robert Fortey’s breath, so he was arrested and taken to headquarters for testing. Results showed he had between 290 and 300 milligrams of alcohol in 100 milliliters of blood.
“More than three times the legal limit,” Justice Krista Lynn Leszczynski pointed out.
The judge told Fortey he was lucky there wasn’t a crash that injured himself or somebody else.
“And, thankfully, not something more tragic than that,” Leszczynski added.
Defense lawyer James Guggisberg said his client rarely goes out for after-work drinks with his co-workers, but agreed to go on June 10. He severely misjudged his alcohol intake before being pulled over around midnight that Friday, he added.
“It was just sheer luck that nobody was hurt in this instance,” Jones said. “Getting into a car in that state is essentially rolling the dice.
“The risk was huge.”
Fortey, 52, declined a chance to address the court Tuesday after pleading guilty to one charge of impaired driving. Guggisberg added his client is extremely embarrassed and ashamed about what took place.
“(He) assure me that this is a mistake he will not make twice,” he said.
Fortey had no prior criminal record. Jones asked for a $4,000 penalty while Guggisberg suggested a fine between $2,500 and $3,000. Leszczynski settled on $3,000 along with the mandatory one-year driving ban.
A second charge was withdrawn.