A MERRIOTT woman who was found slumped over the steering wheel of her car in the middle of the road with her hazards, headlights and fog lights on then drove nearly five miles to her home.

A witness who saw Susan Mary Foreman unconscious in her car thought she was dead when he called the police after failing to rouse her.

However, she then suddenly started to drive off towards the A30 narrowly missing the witness’s car so he followed her and recorded the journey on his dashboard camera.

During the journey she was “all over the road”, travelling at speeds of around 5mph and almost hit another vehicle on a roundabout.

The witness was giving a running commentary to the police and when she reached home she tried to reverse into a parking space and collided with a parked car.

She then drove to a nearby empty street and started messing around with the lights and sounding the horn and when police arrested her she said she was “deliriously tired” after only having had two or three hours sleep.

Foreman, 52, of Church Street, pleaded guilty to driving a Citroen vehicle on roads between Dinnington and Merriott whilst unfit through drink on May 28.

She also admitted driving without due care and attention when she appeared before Somerset Magistrates at Yeovil.

Lucy Coleman, prosecuting, said that after the witness spotted Foreman’s car near Dinngton at 3am he approached the vehicle and saw the defendant alone and unconscious with her head resting on the steering wheel.

“He thought she must be dead and called the police after he couldn’t rouse her but shortly afterwards she started to drive off towards the A30 narrowly missing the witness’s car,” she said.

When police arrested her she said: “Oh no, I’m sorry, I can’t remember, did I hurt anyone?”

“She said she was driving home from a friend’s house and was feeling deliriously tired and could not remember the journey home as she had only had two or three hours sleep,” said Miss Coleman.

Defending solicitor Chris Ivory said that Foreman admitted driving while unfit through drink because she provided a specimen of breath at the police station and was slightly over the drink drive limit.

He said: “A back calculation was done but the expert could not be sure if she was over the limit at the time of driving.

“She was deliriously tired because she was working full time as a farm shop assistant and at a nursery doing heavy lifting and was also caring for her elderly mother in Worthing and was doing 260 mile round trips. That night she went out with a friend to a pub and had a cider shandy and then a few glasses of wine and believed she was fine to drive but became very tired and pulled over.

“That was when the witness woke her up and she decided to drive home and she did not know whether it was the alcohol or tiredness that brought the level of her driving down.”

The magistrates banned Foreman from driving for 17 months and fined her £240 with a £150 court charge, £85 costs and a £24 victim surcharge.