A SEXUAL assault on a woman in a taxi cost a waiter a £650 fine at Dorchester Crown Court.

Kona Miah, 40, of Dover Road, Weymouth, was also ordered to pay £350 prosecution costs after he pleaded guilty to sexual assault.

Prosecutor Iain Ross said the woman was three times the legal drink-drive limit when she got into a taxi with Miah after a night out in Weymouth.

Mr Ross said the early hours assault happened last September after the woman had gone for a meal with friends and went drinking in Weymouth pubs and clubs.

He said the pair got into a taxi at 2.30am in St Mary Street and Miah had asked to go to his home.

The court was told that the taxi driver could see Miah constantly kissing and fondling the woman in the rear-view mirror and became concerned that she did not respond or react at all except to try and pull away from him.

The taxi driver voiced his concern and Miah told him she had been drinking all day.

Mr Ross said the woman was sick and the taxi driver stopped the car and Miah tried unsuccessfully to pull her out. The woman then said to the driver: "Take me home, I just want to go home."

Miah got back in the taxi and the driver headed back into town but the woman was sick again and he put them out at Wyke Regis Working Men's Club in Portland Road.

The court was told that the taxi driver saw that her top had fallen down and Miah made no attempt to cover her up but gloated and smiled. The taxi driver drove off and called the police.

Miah was arrested and denied a sexual assault, saying the woman had hugged him and he was going to send her home in the taxi after he was dropped off.

Mr Ross said the woman awoke in Dorset County Hospital with her last memory that of being in Barracuda Bar.

Doctors and police were concerned that she had been given a sedative drug but tests proved negative, her alcohol consumption was calculated to be 250 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood at the time of the assault. That equates to three times the drink-drive limit.

The court was told that she was a respectable married woman and that Miah had been of previous good character.

Mr Ross said Miah was married with family in London, and worked as a waiter in an Indian restaurant in Weymouth.

David Campbell, in mitigation, said Miah wished to apologise to the woman and the taxi driver.

He said: "It was a lack of judgement influenced by alcohol. Inexcusable, but something which is a one-off."

Judge Christopher Harvey Clark said it was not necessary for Miah to be put on the sex offenders' register.

He said: "You took advantage of a very drunk young woman. She was so drunk she was incapable of standing on her own feet and she was incapable of consenting to your sexual advance on her."

He warned Miah not to get into a similar situation again.