A DRINK-DRIVER who fell asleep at the wheel and crashed into another car was jailed for 18 months yesterday.

Malcolm Bullock, 48, was under a ten-year driving ban when he drank almost a bottle of vodka and cans of lager before driving home through Redcar in the early evening of August 3 last year.

He slumped over the wheel of his Volkswagen Passat, which veered across the road and hit a Mitsubishi Shogun.

He drove on for another two miles through the centre of Redcar before the Shogun driver pulled him from his car, said Nigel Soppitt, prosecuting, at Teesside Crown Court yesterday.

Bullock, who was nearly two-and-a-half times over the alcohol limit, told police he could not remember getting behind the wheel.

The court heard how Bullock was disqualified for ten years and jailed for six months by Scarborough magistrates last year for breaking an earlier ban.

Robin Turton, defending, said that Bullock recognised that he had a drink problem but had been drowning his sorrows after the death of his father.

Recorder Jonathon Rose told Bullock: "You have shown a wanton disregard for the law, and on this occasion you caused havoc with your driving.

"It is only by good fortune that you avoided hitting pedestrians and, perhaps, kill-ing pedestrians and other road users.

"To my mind this is close to the most serious offence of dangerous driving because of the distance, the time of day and the continuing disregard for other members of the public."

Bullock, of Fawcus Court, Redcar, was jailed for 18 months and banned for five years, to run concurrent with his ten-year ban, after he pleaded guilty to dangerous driving on August 3 last year, and to driving with excess alcohol and while disqualified.