A barrister who refused to give a sample of breath after police stopped her Range Rover on the grounds she had just had cosmetic surgery was ‘worried you would fail the test’, judge told her yesterday.
Rachel Tansey, 44, initially refused to use a breathalyser saying she’d had cosmetic surgery done on her lips the day before, a court heard.
The ‘snappy’ mother-of-three also wouldn’t take a blood test on the grounds that she had phobia of needles.
She was last month found guilty of failing to provide a specimen after a district judge said her account ‘lacks any credibility whatsoever’.
Convicting her, District Judge James Hatton said she had attempted to ‘backtrack’ from saying she’d had her ‘lips done’ due to the ‘inference’ that a needle had been used.
He warned her she faced a possible prison sentence.
But yesterday Tansey wiped away tears as a different judge imposed a community order and a two-year driving ban.
The incident occurred in the early hours of April 20, 2023 when Tansey was reported to be ‘weaving around’ a bypass at 20mph near her £1.4million mansion in Formby, Merseyside.
Rachel Tansey, 44, pictured leaving court after receiving a two-year driving ban
Tansey, 44, initially refused to use a breathalyser saying she’d had cosmetic surgery done on her lips the day before
At the time she was in the midst of an acrimonious divorce at the time while on a break from law to run restaurants and bars, her trial was told.
Among her business interests was the Liverpool branch of controversial restaurant chain Hooters, which has been accused of creating a ‘sexually objectifying and misogynistic environment’ over its scantily-clad female waitresses.
When police asked the barrister to provide a breath sample, she only partially got her lips around the tube then cited cosmetic treatment the day before, Sefton magistrates court heard.
‘I am doing my very best,’ she told them.
‘It is like asking someone to jump up after a tummy tuck. I cannot do it.’
Tansey denied wrong-doing, insisting she had only been driving slowly as she had dropped a chicken wrap and been swilling mouthwash.
But a healthcare professional confirmed there was no reason why she could not provide a sample.
She appeared for sentence at Liverpool magistrates court yesterday where District Judge Timothy Boswell said she had been ‘obstructive from the start’.
Tansey appeared before Liverpool Magistrates’ Court (pictured) yesterday for sentencing
Saying she had ‘deliberately refused to provide a sample’, he added: ‘The only proper inference I can draw is that you were worried you would fail the test.’
It was therefore impossible to say whether or not she had been above the drink-drive limit, he added.
The judge imposed a 12 month community order and ordered her to pay prosecution costs and surcharge totalling £764.
He also banned her from driving for two years and ordered her to carry out 130 hours’ unpaid work.
Tansey, who was wearing a long black dress and black ankle boots, wiped away tears as she was sentenced.
Earlier Jack Cooper, representing Tansey, said she had no previous convictions.
He said she accepted being ‘snappy’ with police and felt ‘ashamed’ to be in the dock but had not felt ‘unfit to drive’.
The company through which Tansey operated Hooters in Liverpool went into liquidation last year.
