A MANIAC motorist is behind bars for trying to outrun police in a drunken 145mph chase - while he had his dog on his lap.

Alan Richardson had downed three bottles of cider before going to look for his missing pet and panicked when he saw the police.

A court heard how the Tibetan terrier had learned how to open a front room bay window latch and escape from home.

Richardson had just found the pooch in Thornaby, near Stockton, when police became suspicious of his Audi A3 parked up at 3am.

The 46-year-old took off and tore around residential areas at up to 80mph, prosecutor Emma Atkinson told Teesside Crown Court.

His speeds reached 120mph on the south-bound A19 and 145mph on the A174 road towards east Cleveland as air support was called in.

After a 20-minute pursuit, the hatchback was finally brought to a halt when police rolled out a spiked Stinger device.

Miss Atkinson said: "The defendant struggled to keep control of the vehicle and it eventually slowed down.

"Police officers approached him and he was in the driver's seat alone, and had a dog on his lap. He smelled strongly of alcohol."

Tests showed he was just over the limit - with 95mg of alcohol in 100ml of blood when the legal figure is 80mg, said the lawyer.

Peter Wishlade, mitigating, said ex-lorry driver Richardson accepted his actions were "stupid, reprehensible and unacceptable".

He told the court: "The Tibetan terrier, they have subsequently discovered, manages to open the front window and escape.

"It escaped on this particular night. This was the first time. He had had three reasonably-sized bottles of Magners cider.

"He went out on foot looking for the dog but could not find it, then made the first of his wrong choices to go back and get the car to widen the search."

Mr Wishlade said Richardson had suffered mental health problems as the result of mounting debts, and was now "up the creek".

He was jailed for 14 months and disqualified for five years after he admitted dangerous driving and excess alcohol on March 14.

Judge Simon Bourne-Arton, QC, told him: "You were exposing members of the public to serious risk if not death. Looking for a dog is no excuse."

The pursuit started in Lanehouse Road, Thornaby - just two streets away from Richardson's home in Lindisfarne Avenue.