A TEENAGER has lost his driving licence after stopping to smoke cannabis just yards from his home.

Christopher Gethin admitted drug-driving when he appeared at Hereford Magistrates Court on November 11.

The nineteen-year-old was stopped by police as he drove a Land Rover Freelander on College Road in Hereford on May 31, prosecutor Peter Love told the court.

He was asked to take a roadside drug test after officers noticed a smell of cannabis coming from the car, and was arrested after it returned a positive result.

An evidential blood test at Hereford Police Station revealed he had seven microgrammes of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol per litre of blood, more than three times the legal limit of two.

More court news:

George Cousins, for Gethin, said it had been a bad year for the young driver.

"He was sacked the day before lockdown and then he had some problems with a hand he had broken, which has been left deformed," Mr Cousins said.

"On that day he said he was fed up generally. He had been to his girlfriend's and stopped about 100 yards from his house as he drove home to smoke some cannabis, as he could not do that at home.

"But as he pulled out, he was pulled over by the police."

The court heard Gethin had recently found a new job in Ross-on-Wye, but would lose it as a result of a mandatory driving ban.

Gethin, of College Road, Hereford, was disqualified from driving for 12 months and fined £110. He must pay costs of £85 and a £34 victim surcharge.