Mother previously acquitted after blaming health drink faces new court charges after car flips

A Sydney mother who was acquitted last month of a high-range drink-driving charge after blaming a health drink for an elevated breath test has been charged again after her vehicle flipped in a separate crash, police said.

New South Wales Police allege Natasha Jansen, 49, overturned her Toyota HiLux after colliding with a parked car in Northbridge about 11:30 a.m. on August 29. Emergency services treated her at the scene for minor injuries, and investigators say she recorded a positive roadside breath test before later refusing to submit to a breath analysis at Chatswood Police Station. She has been charged with negligent driving and failing to submit a breath analysis.

A NSW Police spokesman said officers were called to Kameruka Road following reports of a crash and found the overturned vehicle. "The driver, a 49-year-old woman, was treated at the scene by NSW Ambulance paramedics for minor injuries," the spokesman said. "She was subjected to a roadside breath test, which allegedly returned a positive result."

The new charges come weeks after Magistrate Margaret McGlynn dismissed high-range drink-driving charges against Jansen on August 11. That earlier case arose after she fell asleep in her car outside the playing fields at a private school in Northbridge on the afternoon of July 23, 2024, creating a traffic queue and prompting a police breath test that returned a reading of 0.243 percent — nearly five times the legal limit of 0.05.

Jansen’s defence counsel, Michael Bowe, argued during the previous hearing that a skin-care and health regimen that included drinking liquid chlorophyll, together with a reflux condition, produced alcohol in her mouth and led to an inaccurately high breathalyser result. The court heard that Jansen had consumed two 500ml bottles of a commercial liquid chlorophyll product while waiting outside the school.

An expert witness called by the defence, neuropharmacology professor Macdonald Christie, told the court the volume Jansen consumed should have produced a blood-alcohol concentration of 0.12 or less — below the threshold for a high-range charge — and that regurgitation caused by reflux could leave alcohol in the mouth that a breathalyser might detect without it reflecting blood alcohol.

Magistrate McGlynn accepted the defence evidence at the August hearing and dismissed the high-range drink-driving matter. The magistrate found that the breath test result could have been contaminated by alcohol present in the mouth rather than reflecting Jansen’s bloodstream.

Police allege that in the August 29 crash Jansen again returned a positive reading at the roadside and later refused a breath analysis at Chatswood Police Station. The new charges are listed to be dealt with in court next month.

The matters remain before the courts. Jansen has not publicly commented on the new charges; her lawyer represented her in the earlier proceedings.