A DRINK driver responsible for a hit and run that left a man with head injuries has been warned to prepare for jail.

Paula Joanne Robinson-Ridge, 40, was nearly four times the drink drive limit as she drove along Nunnery Lane, York, on March 21, 2017, York Magistrates’ Court heard.

She hit pedestrian Martyn Cawood at the junction of Blossom Street and Nunnery Lane and drove off without stopping, leaving him badly injured on the ground.

Police put out an immediate public appeal to trace the black Nissan she was driving and she was arrested shortly afterwards.

When Robinson-Ridge, of Hollybank Road, Holgate, appeared before the court yesterday, she pleaded guilty to causing serious injury to Mr Cawood by dangerous driving, failure to stop at the scene of an accident, and failure to give her details or report the accident within 24 hours.

She also pleaded guilty to drink driving when she had 140 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath. The legal limit is 35 micrograms.

District judge Adrian Lower decided the case was too serious for him to deal with and sent her for sentence to York Crown Court where she will appear on June 29.

“I am not excluding that you will go to prison and you must prepare yourself for that,” he told her.

Her solicitor Liam Hassan asked for probation officers to prepare a report on her before she is sentenced and agreed with the district judge that she had a drink problem.

The district judge ordered the report and released Robinson-Ridge on bail. He also disqualified her from driving. The exact length of her ban will be decided by a judge at the crown court.

On the day of the crash, witnesses told The Press that Mr Cawood had been on the pavement when he was hit and the Nissan had mounted the pavement before hitting him.