Woman driving at 90mph was trying to inject heroin

A woman who drove at 90mph while trying to inject herself with heroin has been given a 12-month prison sentence suspended for a year.

Rachel Curtis, 23, led officers on a 30-mile chase at the wheel of a stolen Ford Focus that had been spotted driving “erratically” on the Severn Bridge in the early hours of April 24. Curtis admitted dangerous driving, possessing Class A drugs and driving while uninsured.

Sam Jones, for the prosecution, told Bristol Crown Court that the officers had been on “a dangerous high-speed pursuit, lasting more than 20 minutes. They could see the person driving had a tourniquet and a syringe and was trying to inject while driving.” Curtis sped along the M4 in the direction of London before turning off at junction 18 before for Bath and driving through a red light.

Mr Jones said: “The car travelled at 90mph in a 60mph limit and overtook a heavy goods vehicle. The car went at twice the speed limit through a village.” After careering over a roundabout with two of the car’s wheels in the air Curtis doubled back and rejoined the eastbound M4. With police in hot pursuit she pulled off at the Leigh Delamere services where she braked so suddenly that the patrol car ploughed into the back of the car she was driving.

An officer approached the Ford and saw Curtis trying to finish injecting, before he smashed his way into the car with a baton. Curtis, from Swansea, told police she had not stolen the car but had bought it from her dealer for £50.

Georgina Buckley, for Curtis, said that her client was “extremely remorseful” and had been under pressure from her former partner's mother to get the car and pick him up. The court was also told that the defendant came from a loving and stable background and had aspired to go to university before being introduced to drugs by the former partner.