"Reasonable excuse" for driver's failure to provide specimen  

Melissa Piggott v DPP [2008] EWHC 305 (Admin)

> Piggott v Director of Public Prosecutions; [2008] WLR (D) 44

On 8 February 2008 the Administrative Court (Moses LJ and Sullivan J) quashed the Appellant’s conviction for failure to provide a specimen, where the lower court had accepted medical evidence that she was unable to provide a sample because of asthma and hyperventilation syndrome, but ruled that she could not raise ‘reasonable excuse’ because she had not told the officer in charge of the Intoxilyser (although they accepted that she may have told another officer who participated in the test).

In so ruling, the Court accepted that a failure to mention such medical condition at the time would be strong evidence that the person was in fact refusing to give a sample, but could not prevent the statutory defence being raised. On the findings of the lower court there was no conclusion that she was doing other than trying her best to provide the sample.

The case is important because it overrules obiter in; Teape v Godfrey [1986] RTR 213, which had been followed in a number of other cases. However, the ratio of Teape remains good law; that someone who simply refuses to try and give the sample cannot later rely on such medical evidence, because it is irrelevant.

Pete Weatherby represented the Appellant, instructed by Kevin O’Donovan of Sharif and O’Donovan Solicitors, Sheffield.

Quick links

> Melissa Piggott v DPP considered: The recent ‘Piggott’ case has changed the boundaries of ‘reasonable excuse’ where a person fails to provide a breathalyser sample. Elizabeth Davidson speaks to Garden Court North’s Pete Weatherby, who acted for the appellant (published for 24 hours at http://www.new-law-journal.co.uk/ and on Lexis Nexis Butterworths LawLeader) - 06/03/08