A WOMAN turned to drink and drove under the influence of alcohol after being raped on a business trip.

Karen Preece, 44, told Blackburn magistrates her life had been torn apart by the attack which happened in a Brussels park.

After the incident she became dependent on alcohol and drove to a friend's home while more than three times over the legal limit.

Preece, who lives at a farm in Twiston in the Ribble Valley, pleaded guilty to driving with excess alcohol. She was banned from driving for two years and fined £1,000 with £50 costs.

The court was told Preece was dragged into a park after arriving in Belgium to act as a special adviser to the European Union in July.

The attacker - who has not been caught - threatened to kill her, said Richard Taylor defending.

He said Preece worked as an enterprise adviser in Blackpool and also as an adviser to the EU on telecom programmes. She had been travelling to Brussels about 10 times a year since 2000 and had a set routine.

He said: "When she travelled to Brussels on July 3 the plane was delayed and she arrived later than normal.

"It was dark and she was making her way to the hotel when she was accosted, attacked and raped. She was told she would be killed.

"The attack went on for some time and she was left in that park."

The damage caused had been physical and emotional and Preece had found herself unable to sleep without the help of alcohol.

This became a habit and she was on large amounts of medication.

Mr Taylor said: "She is doing everything she can to rebuild her life and my plea to you today is to help and assist with that. Disqualification will be a very real hardship."

Passing sentence, Austin Molloy, chairman of the magistrates, said they had taken into consideration the change in Preece's life and the stress and fear she had been subject to.

Yet he said: "However, there was great risk of harm to the public".

A tearful Preece later told The Lancashire Telegraph the incident had devastated her life. The authorities in Belgium do not have a forensic link to the attacker, who she said was Eastern European.

She said: "I had never expected it to happen to me. It is horrible. I have been on all sorts of medication, I don't know whether I am coming or going. I didn't know whether I had got AIDS or not.

"I didn't get the test results back from the hospital until after the driving offence and I was beside myself."

She said her weight dropped from eight-and-a-half-stone to seven stone and three pounds. She also started having panic attacks.

Speaking of the driving offence, she said: "I found out that morning that a friend of mine had died. He had cancer of the pancreas, he had found out only two weeks before he died.

"He left four children and it threw me over the edge."

Preece said: "I couldn't eat. I was being sick all night and I just wanted to die. Now I can't drive for another two years. I live two miles from the nearest bus stop."

Preece said she was "mortified" by her behaviour and would now not be able to make the 110-mile daily round trip to Blackpool.

She said: "I am desperate to get back to work. I have had a clean driving licence for 27 years."

The court heard that Preece gave a reading of 289 in blood against the legal limit of 80.