A QUAD bike rider who was more than three times the drink-drive limit when he fled from police with a child sitting on his lap, was yesterday jailed for eight months.

Durham Crown Court was told the three-year-old girl was holding onto the handlebars as the bike swerved across the road and sped off.

Neither he nor the child had crash helmets.

Paul Richard Forsyth took off towards a former railway track near Bridge Road, in Shotton Colliery, County Durham, on September 20.

When he was caught, after the quad bike broke down, police found he was more than three times the drink-drive limit, with 116 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath.

When police approached him he remarked said: “What am I supposed to do on a Saturday afternoon with a threeyear- old child?”

He told the officers he had consumed a lot of alcoholic spirits and lager the night before and had only had five hours sleep.

Forsyth, of North Road East, Wingate, was committed to Durham Crown Court for sentence after appearing at Peterlee Magistrates’ Court where he admitted one charge of exposing a child to injury and a number of motoring offences, including drink-driving.

The offences were committed only months after he was convicted by Durham magistrates of being drunk in charge of a child, the court was told.

In that case, Forsyth was so intoxicated when he tried to get on a boat on the river with a child in Durham, that bystanders had removed the child from him. He was fined £200 after he admitted that offence.

Scott Smith, mitigating, said Forsyth had shown remorse and had was addressing his alcohol problem.

Passing sentence, Judge Chris Prince said the earlier conviction should have alerted Forsyth to the importance of his responsibilities when taking care of children.

He said: “During the course of this driving, you briefly exposed the child to extreme risk of death or serious injury.”

Forsyth was sentenced to a month jail for drink-driving to run concurrently with eight months in prison for exposing the child to injury. He was also disqualified from driving for a year.

Judge Prince said Forsyth could be released on licence after four months.