A single mother who injured a motorcyclist in a hit and run faces sentencing today after a judge declared himself struggling yesterday to decide her fate.

Christine Scott, who has children aged five and ten, hit Clarke Burgess in the early hours of the morning after consuming ?a few beers?, leaving him with a gaping leg wound.

The 30-year-old left Supreme Court in tears yesterday after Puisne Judge Carlisle Greaves adjourned the case saying: ?I will have to sleep on this. I don?t think I can sentence now. I have to say I didn?t think I would struggle on a traffic case. I have never struggled on a traffic case before. I don?t think I have ever been faced with anything like this before.? He asked that the victim should come to court today to give his view on the matter.

Crown counsel Cindy Clarke had told the judge that Police attended the collision at the junction of The Glebe Road and Bishop Spencer Road at 3.10 a.m. on Saturday, June 11, 2005. Mr. Burgess, the rider of a red Vespa motorcycle, was receiving medical treatment. He said he had been struck on the left side by the car as it pulled out of Bishop Spencer Road. He was taken to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital where he was treated for an eight centimetre wound to his left ankle, through which the talus bone had emerged. He said he had been drinking until one hour before the collision.

Police inquiries led them Scott?s home at Peak Lane, Warwick, where they saw black Hyundai motor car with a rear licence plate matching a front plate found at the scene. The defendant admitted being the driver. The officers noticed that her eyes were glazed and she smelt of liquor, and she told them she had consumed a few beers prior to driving. Scott, who works as an administrative assistant at a bank, later failed the alco-analyser test with a reading of 121 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood when the legal limit is 80. Her car was found to be uninsured with no licence.

In a Police statement, Scott said she had felt a bump on the front of her car as she proceeded into the junction, and knew this was a motorcycle as she had seen the headlight. However, she claimed that she thought the motorcycle had driven off.

At a previous court hearing, she pleaded guilty to causing actual bodily harm through reckless driving, and driving with no vehicle licence or insurance. Ms Clarke recommended that an appropriate sentence for these offences would be between six and 12 months imprisonment.

Scott?s lawyer, Richard Horseman, urged the judge not to jail her, saying: ?She doesn?t seek to shirk away from the fact that this accident was her fault and she?s extremely remorseful for having caused it.? He revealed that before she had visited Mr. Clarke in hospital to apologise, and is in the process of paying him $5,000 compensation. Scott has no previous convictions.

Mr. Justice Greaves said: ?This man was struck and it was not a glancing blow. That?s a classic hit and run and that?s very aggravating no matter how nice she might have been before ... it was a hit and run and left the man in the dark of the night.?

He told Mr. Horseman: ?I?m really struggling on how I cannot send this woman to jail. The only real mitigation, to tell you the truth, is that this man was not more seriously injured.?

The case was set to resume in Supreme Court 3 today at 11.30 a.m.