An Ashford father-of-four who led police on a car chase along the M20 at nearly double the speed limit has kept his freedom... because he didn't crash.

Lee Baldock, 31, downed two cans of lager, a bottle of wine and a "swig" of cider before getting behind the wheel of his powerful Volvo 850 in June.

He was spotted at 10.30pm by two police officers on patrol along a stretch of the motorway near junctions eight and nine.

Prosecutor Trevor Wright told Canterbury Crown Court how the police car was overtaken by the speeding Volvo.

One of the officers, PC Ian Jefferys, later reported: "I immediately increased the speed of my vehicle to catch up. I accelerated to 130mph and still struggled to keep pace with the speeding vehicle.

"I couldn't see the colour of the car or read its index plate despite following it for several minutes.

"As we were approaching Junction 10 the Volvo veered from lane three, to two and then to the nearside lane before taking the exit slip road towards a roundabout."

Baldock was then seen racing through three red lights before finally stopping outside his home in Fairview Drive, Willesborough.

Mr Wright said that during the journey the police car had its lights flashing and sounding its siren "and Baldock would have been aware of that".

He added: "Yet despite that he maintained his speeds of between 120mph and 130mph on the motorway and was deliberately failing to stop.

"Even after leaving the motorway the Volvo continued at some considerable speed past the Ashford Retail park – travelling well above the speed limit.

"He went past two parked cars, causing an oncoming car to abruptly brake," he added.

The prosecutor said another officer then arrested Baldock, who began being "abusive and uncooperative" - screaming foul language.

He was "taken to the ground and arrested" after more officers arrived to help and then to a nearby hospital where he gave a blood sample, which revealed he was over the drink-drive limit.

At the police station, the driver claimed he thought he was only travelling at 75mph and had travelled home from visiting family in Sittingbourne after consuming "a couple of tins of Stella Artois larger, a whole bottle of wine and a swig from an opened bottle of cider".

He later told officers he now wished he had not gone out that night.

His lawyer Kerry Waite said: "This was an appalling course of driving, aggravated by being prolonged and persistent and also by the consumption of alcohol."

“In a sense you have been saved by the fact that there was no crash. If there had been a crash then it might have been fatal” - Judge Nigel Van Der Bijl

Baldock, who admitted driving dangerously and drink driving, was banned from driving for a year and ordered to re-take his driving test.

Judge Nigel Van Der Bijl gave him an 18-month jail sentence suspended for two years and ordered him to do 100 hours of unpaid work for the community.

He toild him: "In a sense you have been saved by the fact that there was no crash.

"If there had been a crash then it might have been fatal."

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