Richard Hammond was once given a three-month driving ban before he was caught speeding last December.
The TV presenter, 56, has been fined £999 by a court after he was caught speeding twice in the space of three weeks while driving his luxury cars
At Telford Magistrates’ Court last week, he was handed seven penalty points for his licence.
His Porsche Taycan Cross Turismo was clocked at 68mph in a 50mph limit on the A40 in Pencraig, Herefordshire on December 2.
And on December 22, Hammond’s Bentley Continental GT was speeding at 82mph in a 70mph limit on the A50 Rudhall Overbridge in Herefordshire.
It has now resurfaced that he and Top Gear co-star Jeremy Clarkson received a three-month driving ban in France in 2013 after they were caught speeding.
The pair were stopped by French police while driving on a toll motorway during the filming of a Top Gear The Perfect Road Trip DVD segment.
They believed they were in a 130 km/h zone but were actually in a 90 km/h section; Mr Clarkson was recorded at about 141 km/h and Mr Hammond at 143 km/h.
Police issued on‑the‑spot fines (reportedly taking the cash they had on them) and imposed an immediate three‑month suspension of their licences for driving in France.
The ban applied only to driving on French roads; it was not a worldwide or UK driving disqualification.
From the December incidents, West Mercia Police brought two prosecutions against Mr Hammond, putting forward the speed camera images of him driving the cars in Herefordshire to prove the offences.
Court papers also reveal how police spent weeks sending letters to Mr Hammond’s multimillion-pound portfolio of homes in a bid to track him down.
Police sent speeding tickets to a Grade II* listed Herefordshire castle bought by Hammond in 2012 and a £1 million farm estate near Hereford, but the letters were returned marked as “addressee gone away”.
Eventually they tracked him down to his £2 million mansion near Abergavenny in Wales where it was noted more than 30 vehicles are currently registered.
Police also set out in court papers that Hammond had been accused of another driving offence in August last year.
Hammond was prosecuted for two offences of speeding and two further allegations that he had ignored the police letters and failed to identify himself as the guilty driver.
In a letter to the court, the presenter’s solicitor pleaded guilty to the speeding charges and denied the other two offences, writing: “He replied identifying himself as the driver. He sent the reply by First Class post. He posted the reply himself.”
The police force opted to withdraw those extra charges, as Hammond was prosecuted and convicted for the speeding offences in the Single Justice Procedure – a fast-track court process which allows magistrates to sit behind closed doors to deal with low level criminal cases.
He was among 39 defendants who were convicted of driving offences by Ms Minton during the court session on July 22.
