You may have a complete defence to the charge of drink driving. This means that you should plea not guilty at the first hearing, at which point your case will be adjourned for trial.
The trial will be in the magistrates court in about 3 to 4 months from the date of the first hearing. The case can only be heard in the magistrates court, because drink driving is a summary only offence.
This time will allow us to prepare for your trial, which typically involves the following:
- Meeting with you in person in order to prepare for the hearing, which would include going over trial strategy, and going over issues that are likely to be raised in your cross-examination.
- Obtaining the evidence that you need in order to win your case, this might include good character evidence, other witness statements to prove where you were at the time of the offence etc.
- Finally, we will represent you at the trial. This is something not at all straightforward, and requires someone experienced to do a good a good job. Otherwise the prosecutor is likely to run circles around the defence.
Typical defences might be:
- You were not the driver of the car.
- You were not over the drink driving limit and there was a fault with the intoximeter machine.