A man was jailed for a year and banned from driving until 2003 after he was caught driving while impaired four times in the past two years.

Gary Mclean Dillas, 46, of Spanish Point Road, pleaded guilty on Friday in Magistrates' Court to driving while impaired on December 11, driving while disqualified, having an unlicensed vehicle, and an uninsured vehicle.

Prosecutor Sgt. Phil Taylor told Senior Magistrate Will Francis that Dillas was stopped on an auxiliary cycle as he rode west in St. David's just before 2 a.m. on December 11.

When asked if he had been drinking, Dillas told Police: "Yeah, one, two, three beers.'' He was taken to Hamilton Police Station where an alco-analyser test showed that he had 162 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood. The legal limit is 80 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood.

Dillas failed to blow into the machine for sufficient time for the second test, and Mr. Francis accepted the single reading.

Police also discovered Dillas had been disqualified until March 3, 2002.

Sgt. Taylor told Mr. Francis: "Your Worship, we have here a four-time loser in two years for impaired and disqualified driving.'' After some deliberation between Mr. Francis and Sgt. Taylor about sentencing, Mr. Francis asked Dillas if he had anything to say.

Dillas told him that he had overslept on the day of the incident, missed the bus and had "taken a chance''.

Mr. Francis replied: "You look pretty fit to me. Anybody fit could walk from one end of St. David's to the other. Why didn't you walk?'' Dillas replied that it was dangerous to walk in St. David's at night because of bad driving on narrow and curving roads.

"Maybe you shouldn't say any more,'' Mr. Francis replied. "You mean to tell me you felt it safer to drive while impaired than to walk while impaired on the same road? "There is only one course here,'' he continued. "Three times in two years, he has not learned a lesson.

"You were a hazard out on that road, Mr. Dillas.'' Mr. Francis sentenced Dillas for 12 months for impaired driving and three months for driving while disqualified, both sentences are to run concurrently.

Mr. Francis also fined Dillas $500 for driving without insurance and $300 for driving without a licence.

He further disqualified Dillas from driving all motor vehicles for two years for driving while disqualified.