A DANGEROUS driver who had been drinking mounted a pavement to escape from a police car that pulled up in front of him was jailed for more than a year.

Zachary Williams, 24, who has a long list of serious motoring convictions, made his getaway in his Volkswagen Golf outside Blisters nightclub in Bargoed town centre.

Prosecutor Ruth Smith told Cardiff Crown Court how the he was first alerted to police by a Caerphilly council CCTV camera operator who spotted him swigging from a bottle of lager.

Co-defendant Haydn Tilley, who hasn’t passed his driving test, was with Williams throughout and was at the wheel when the pair returned to the scene a little later and reversed into another police car before ramming a taxi.

Again they fled, before officers eventually caught up with them after they had dumped the car in the early hours of Saturday, February 17 and the duo were arrested.

Williams was breathalysed and tested positive with 46 microgrammes per 100 millilitres of breath. The legal limit is 35 microgrammes per 100 millilitres of breath.

Tilley, 21, was given a six-month jail sentence, suspended for 15 months, ordered to carry out 175 hours of unpaid work and given a 12-month driving ban.

Miss Smith said there were no pedestrians walking when Williams, 24, of Trelys Close, Victoria Road, Fleur-de-Lys, near Blackwood, drove along the pavement and sped away.

He was next spotted by a police van after he had stopped at the Capel Garage in Pengam for fuel.

The prosecutor said the Golf left the forecourt and “overtook another vehicle, causing the third party to perform and emergency stop”.

Miss Smith said Williams had 22 sets previous convictions for 67 offences, which included dangerous driving, drink driving, driving whilst disqualified and driving with no insurance.

Stephen Thomas, mitigating, said his client was a “troubled young man” who had suffered from alcohol and drug problems.

Andrew Kendall, mitigating for Tilley, of Church Street, Rhymney, said he was an expectant father who had entered early guilty pleas to dangerous driving and driving with no insurance or licence.

Judge Timothy Petts jailed Williams for a total of 410 days and he was banned from driving for three years and 205 days.