Drunk man who drove against traffic for 800m along CTE jailed, disqualified
A man who drove against the flow of traffic along the Central Expressway (CTE) for 800 metres while intoxicated was jailed for 10 weeks on Monday (4 March).
Chin Kaixiang, who was driving a BMW car, later fell asleep on the road shoulder of the expressway.
The 34-year-old director of a financial recovery firm was also given a four-year driving ban.
He pleaded guilty in the State Courts to one count of drink driving and one count of rash driving. One count of not stopping after being involved in an accident was taken into consideration for sentencing.
On 28 November 2017, Chin had consumed five glasses of whiskey at a discotheque located at Jalan Sultan. He had intended to drive to his home in Yishun.
After driving off, Chin sped along Nicoll Highway towards Guillemard Road and side-swiped another car before entering the Kallang-Paya Lebar Expressway tunnel.
He mounted a kerb while exiting the tunnel towards the Pan-Island Expressway Tuas. Several minutes later, after cutting into several chevron markings, Chin stopped his car at the left road shoulder along the CTE heading towards Seletar Expressway with half his car protruding out onto the leftmost lane.
For about 23 minutes, Chin fell asleep in his car before being woken up by two other motorists. Chin drove off but barely two minutes later, he fell asleep at a traffic light junction along Ang Mo Kio Avenue 3. He failed to move off when the traffic lights turned green and only woke up after he was honked at.
Chin then made a wrong right turn and drove against the flow of traffic for about 50 metres. He later parked his car at a carpark dormitory at Boundary Close and fell asleep for half an hour.
At about 11.40pm, Chin drove against the flow of traffic along the CTE heading towards Ayer Rajah Expressway for about 800 metres. He forced multiple vehicles to go out of their way to avoid colliding into his car.
Several minutes later, Chin halted his car at the road shoulder along the expressway and fell asleep in the car.
A member of the public called the police about the incident and police officers arrived at about 11.50pm. They observed that Chin smelled of alcohol. Chin failed a breathalyser test and was arrested.
Chin had 67 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath, which was nearly twice the legal limit of 35 microgrammes of alcohol per 100 millilitres of breath.
The whole incident on the road was recorded by Chin’s in-car camera.
The prosecution sought a sentence of three months’ jail while Chin’s lawyer, Choo Si Sen, asked for a four-week jail sentence.
Choo pointed out that nobody was injured in this case even though his client’s driving behaviour was dangerous.
For drink driving, Chin could have been jailed up to six months and fined between $1,000 and $5,000 on a first conviction.
For rash driving so as to endanger human life, he could have been jailed up to one year, and/or fined up to $5,000.
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