A police officer is refusing to resign from the force despite crashing her £40,000 car into a roundabout after a boozy night out.
PC Leigh Shaw smashed into road signs and a bollard before hitting the roundabout after a police chase near Beith, in Ayrshire, Scotland.
Shaw was taken to hospital where she refused to give a sample of breath to her fellow officers, the Daily Record reports.
She was charged with careless driving, reduced from a more serious charge of dangerous driving, and was sentenced to seven weeks on an electronic tag.
Despite writing off her BMW M135i car, capable of doing 155mph, Shaw had a replacement blue Audi S3 hot hatch in her driveway, with the same private registration, when the Daily Record knocked on her door.
Some have expressed outrage that Shaw dodged jail when other public figures have been made examples of for less extreme offences.
The officer is virtually certain to be sacked but has refused to resign as the disciplinary process advances.
She is understood to be suspended but Police Scotland has not confirmed any details of her offences or her disciplinary situation.
Shaw, who also uses her married name McCabe, was spotted driving her 320-horsepower car erratically near Beith, in Ayrshire, on January 25.
As police followed the car, drunken Shaw accelerated away but lost control, hitting road signs and a bollard before crashing into the roundabout.
She was later taken to hospital to be treated for injuries, believed to be to her chest area.
The driving charge was originally dangerous driving but was reduced to careless driving, despite the severity of the crash.
When Shaw was approached at Crosshouse Hospital by officers who work in the same division as her to give a breath sample, she refused, despite being fully aware this is regarded at least as seriously as being drunk behind the wheel.
A source said: “This woman wasn’t very popular in Saltcoats and a few colleagues were happy that she got caught.
“She had been on a night out in Paisley but she left the place drunk and decided to drive in any case.
“She ended up heading towards Beith, where police got on her tail and she smashed the car into a roundabout. People expected her to go to jail as the case is aggravated by her being a police officer.
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