Ex-Hooters boss ‘ashamed’ of act breaks down in tears as she’s spared jail
Merseyside Police stopped Tansey’s silver Range Rover Discovery in the early hours of the morning driving “all over the road” at 20mph but she refused a roadside breath test because she had just had her lips done
A former Hooters boss who refused to take a roadside breath test because she just had cosmetic lip surgery has wept in court as she avoided jail.
Barrister Rachael Tansey, 44, broke down in tears as she was sentenced at Liverpool Magistrates Court on Tuesday for failing to provide breath and blood samples.
The mother-of-three – who lives in a £1.4 million mansion in Formby, Merseyside – was pulled over by cops after her Range Rover was seen being driven “all over the road” at 20mph in a 60mph zone in April 2023.
She denied drinking before getting behind the wheel and said her slow speed had been as a result of her dropping a chicken wrap which she had been eating while driving, the Echo reports.
The court heard that when police asked her to provide a breath sample, she only partially put her lips around the tube then cited cosmetic treatment the day before.
She then told officers: “Do not tell me what I can and cannot do.”
Prosecutors told the court Tansey also failed to provide a sample of blood when she was arrested, claiming an undiagnosed phobia of needles.
Tansey, a former manager director of Hooters in Liverpool city centre, was convicted of failing to provide a specimen of blood for analysis following a trial.
She appeared in the dock on Tuesday for sentencing, wearing a black dress and with a pair of glasses perched on top of her head.
And she wiped away tears as she was handed a 12-month community hour with 130 hours of unpaid work.
Jack Cooper, defending, told the court: “She has never been before the court before for anything like this. She wants me to apologise to the court and she has also apologised to the officers.
“She has looked back on the footage. She describes herself as snappy with the officers. She is ashamed to be here.”
District Judge James Hatton told her: “When the police pulled you over, you were obstructive from the start. You have seen the footage.
“You have told the Probation Service that you look at that and think you could have handled yourself better. That is certainly true.
“The only proper inference I can draw is that you were worried you would fail the test.
“You have concealed your true level of intoxication. We do not know if you were above the limit or below the limit.”
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