A motorist got into his car and drove off just moments after a court had banned him from driving, York magistrates heard.
Lee Adlington tried to convince Harrogate magistrates he should keep his driving licence because without it he would suffer “exceptional hardship”.
After he failed and they disqualified him for six months for speeding on the Selby by-pass, he left the courthouse, got into his car and started driving.
Melanie Ibbotson, prosecuting at York Magistrates' Court, said police were put on the alert that Adlington could be breaking the driving ban and at 12.45pm, officers spotted him at the wheel of a Nissan Navara 35 miles away from the courthouse on the A645 at Kellington near Selby.
When they stopped him, he told officers he knew he was banned and added: “How was I supposed to get home?”
Adlington, 41, of Glebelands, Knottingley, pleaded guilty to driving while disqualified.
York magistrates banned him for a further 10 months, and gave him a 12-month community with 160 hours’ unpaid work. He must pay £85 prosecution costs and a £114 statutory surcharge.
Adlington was disqualified under the totting-up procedure at Harrogate hearing on January 27 after he was convicted of speeding at more than 60mph on the Selby by-pass on May 23 last year in the same Nissan Navara that he used to drive to – and from - the Harrogate courthouse.
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He told York magistrates he had asked their Harrogate colleagues not to ban him because of the effect on his business which he had spent three years building up.
He also claimed that the Harrogate court had not told him that the ban started immediately.
But York magistrates said they didn’t believe him because they themselves had imposed bans in other cases and knew that the decision had to be announced with a set form of words that included saying that the ban started immediately.
Adlington told them he had driven to the hearing at the York courthouse.
When they passed their 10-month ban they told him: “You are disqualified from driving any vehicle from this moment until the end of your disqualification, so don’t think of driving off.”
He told them he had arranged for a friend to drive him and his car home.
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