A PREGNANT mother whose unborn daughter has serious kidney problems could give birth behind bars - after clocking up 151 motoring offences.

Rachelle Turner has been jailed for six months by Southampton magistrates, who heard how she had been stopped driving illegally on 38 occasions in ten months.

Turner, 31, who is expecting her fifth daughter in December and has already served five weeks in prison, has been told by doctors that her expected child has dilated kidneys - a condition that will mean the newborn will be forced to fight against infection.

Turner, a former drug-user who only ever held a provisional licence and has previous convictions for unrelated driving offences, was given the jail term for two charges of driving while disqualified and a concurrent sentence for failing to pay almost £4,000 of outstanding fines.

She was also banned from driving for two years after being given six points on her licence for every one of 48 charges of having no insurance.

Today, the baby's 18-year-old father has vowed to fight to free his girlfriend who he fears may go into labour early while in jail.

Lee Baddams, who had expected Turner to be allowed back to their family home in Welland Green, Millbrook, Southampton, told the Daily Echo his girlfriend's solicitor was considering appealing against the sentence.

Mr Baddams, an unemployed roof-fitter, who is to call his first child Leah Crystal, said: "I was devastated when they announced their sentence. It was far too harsh.

"She is very worried about the baby and keeps asking to see a midwife.

"I'm not very happy that she might give birth in jail. That's the one thing she does not want.

"I want to be there when the baby is born but I wouldn't be allowed in to see it as we are not married. She should not be in there."

Of Turner's multiple motoring offences, Mr Baddams - who ironically first met his girlfriend when he offered to fix her car - said: "I was going out to buy cars and do them up and she just drove about in them.

"She is a very good driver and all she ever had was one accident. She used to drive her children to school and wouldn't let them go on their own."

His mother, 46-year-old home carer Jill, added: "So many people get into cars without the proper papers. It just comes down to money. She could not afford them all."

Sentencing magistrates also took into account Turner's convictions for 39 counts of having no test certificate, 43 of driving otherwise than in accordance with a licence, 16 charges of failing to produce insurance, test certificates or driving licence, three charges of having defective tyres, one speeding charge and one of failing to conform to a traffic sign.

Turner, whose four children currently live with her mother in Scotland, was also convicted for failing to respond to bail and breaching a conditional discharge.

The charges all date from between November 1998 and this March. From May last year Turner was stopped frequently for illegal driving.

Prosecutor Rachel Robertson told the court: "By my calculation this defendant has been stopped no less than 38 times by various different police officers over a ten-month period.

"On each occasion they have been similar incidents where the defendant has been stopped by police officers and identified, asked for documents and failed to produce them."

Turner's solicitor Ian Austin made a plea for leniency, saying: "Let there be a light at the end of the tunnel and do not impose a period of ban that is onerous. Miss Turner has gone through a great deal since the offences occurred."

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