A finance boss was caught drink driving after his Mercedes’ onboard computer reported crashing into a lamppost to cops.
Mark Richards, 33, was behind the wheel when he ploughed off the road in Edinburgh, leaving the vehicle badly damaged.
After the Mercedes computer system failed to detect a response from its driver, an automated emergency call was placed to police.
The car even included its GPS coordinates so officers were able to find the exact location.
When officers arrived, they found Richards wandering drunkenly nearby and he was arrested.
Richards appeared at the city’s sheriff court on Tuesday and pled guilty to driving while unfit through drink or drugs on May 31 this year.
Fiscal depute Oliver Davidson-Richards said officers were on patrol at around 12.20am.
Mr Davidson-Richards said they were made aware of a call from a “vehicle safety computer” which transmitted an SOS after being in a collision and finding its driver wasn’t responding.
The court heard the GPS directed them to Whitehill Road in the Craigmillar area where they found a black Mercedes.
The car had struck a wall and a lamppost, leaving it hanging on the road.
Mr Davidson-Richards said there was “extensive damage” to the Mercedes, whose airbags had all deployed, with its windscreen smashed and “the wheels had collapsed”.
The car’s panels were loose and damaged, the headlights were broken, and the “bonnet had cratered”.
Officers found no one in the vehicle but heard an “incoherent” male voice in an adjacent field.
Mr Davidson-Richards said the cops stopped a “drunken male” walking on the road 200 metres away a short time later and found it was Richards.
The court was told Richards, who was “visibly intoxicated”, admitted he’d had two drinks earlier that day.
Richards told officers: “I’m not a drunk driver but obviously I am. I didn’t even know where I was going.”
Defence agent Matthew Nicholson said his client was a team leader for a “major financial institution in Edinburgh”.
Mr Nicholson said Richards and his fiancée had planned to marry this year but were postponing their nuptial due to this incident.
The solicitor said Richards had been “home alone” and had been recently impacted by a bereavement and work stress.
Mr Nicholson said: “He had too much to drink and decided to go to the shops.
“It’s a major source of embarrassment to him.”
Sheriff Grant McCulloch disqualified Richards, of the city’s Danderhall area, from driving for 14 months.
The sheriff classed him as suitable for the drink driver rehabilitation scheme which could reduce that term by three months if he passes its programme.
