An emergency services worker has been fined £125 and sentenced to 40 hours community service for assisting a drink-drive police officer.

Janeann Doyle, of Vicarage Close, Ballabeg, was charged for helping her friend, Constable Stephanie Shaw, of North Shore Road, Ramsey, on July 29 last year by not reporting the incident to police and misinforming officers details of phone conversations between herself and Shaw, who has since resigned from the force and who was sentenced to community service and banned from driving last year.

On Friday, Doyle pleaded guilty to the offence before Deemster Cook at the Court of General Gaol Delivery.

That court heard from the prosecution that Doyle, aged 36, had received a phone call from Shaw on July 28 at 10.20pm, during which Shaw stated that she was getting drunk.

Messages had been sent between them that evening, with the defendant speaking to Shaw via phone into the early hours of the following morning (July 29).

Prosecution detailed that at 1.31am data from Shaw’s phone showed that she had driven to the Mountain Road near the Waterworks, where she crashed her car at around 1.38am.

Shaw called Doyle at 2.37am saying: ’I’ve crashed my car.’

On-duty police officers were driving near the scene of the crash on the morning of July 29 and saw a car creeping up the Gooseneck, on the Mountain Road.

When they stopped the vehicle, they found Shaw and Doyle in the car. Neither of them mentioned the crash to the police officers.

One of the officers asked Shaw to take a breathalyser test, which resulted in a failure and she was subsequently arrested for driving over the prescribed alcohol limit.

Doyle made a statement at police headquarters at 9.30am, saying that she received a call from Shaw around 5am to 5.30am.

This turned out to be false and police became suspicious of her and arrested Doyle for assisting Shaw.

Deemster Cook sentenced the defendant to 40 hours of community service and ordered her to pay a £125 fine to be paid within 28 days.

The court heard that Doyle was an emergency services joint control room worker who had been said to ’go the extra mile’ for people in need.

He stated: ’You went the extra mile in the wrong way. You have lost your good character and people cannot do what you did without a penalty.’