Bilsthorpe man deliberately rammed cop car while on bail for assaulting officers

Andrew Bembridge reached speeds of 65mph and drove “erratically” and without lights before ploughing his borrowed transit van into the front of the police car, on April 25 last year, said Steven Taylor, prosecuting.

The 36-year-old smashed his head against the window as he was driven to the station where a breath test showed he had 90 microgrammes of alcohol when the legal limit is 35 microgrammes.

He was driving on a provisional licence without insurance.

Ten days earlier police received a report of a man behaving suspiciously on Broxtowe Drive, Mansfield, and found Bembridge hiding behind a vehicle.

On the way to the station he became verbally abusive and started to headbutt the interior before flinging his head back and striking an officer on the cheek.

He was "intermittently aggressive" and kicked out at another officer, landing “a solid blow to his chest”.

Nottingham Crown Court heard he was jailed in 2010 for assault causing actual bodily harm, and in 2011 for aggravated vehicle taking.

And in 2016 he received a suspended sentence and a two-year driving ban for failing to provide a breath sample.

Bembridge is also in breach of a community order, imposed in April 2023, for battery and assaulting more officers after “he picked fights for no reason and punched people at Boughton Social Club.”

Benn Robinson, mitigating, said at the time Bembridge had “started a relationship with a woman who works in a pub and was drinking far more than he should have done.”

Since then the qualified mechanic and dad-of-one has undergone a "seismic shift" by voluntarily engaging with an alcohol support group impressive and completing 248 days of a curfew.

“He appreciates the vulnerable situation he is in,” Mr Robinson added. “He deserves full credit for his early guilty pleas.”

Bembridge, of New Road, Bilsthorpe, admitted dangerous driving, assaulting emergency workers, criminal damage, failing to stop, failing to provide a sample, and driving without insurance or a licence.

On Thursday, Recorder Richard Davies imposed a 17-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, with a 120-day alcohol abstinence requirement. He was disqualified from driving.