A PAIR of newlyweds were given the ride of their lives before unexpectedly bearing witness to the full force of the law.

Ali and Paul Bartlett were riding in the back of Wayne Duke’s 1969 Dodge Charger when Dorset Police pulled Mr Duke over in Weymouth for sounding his Dixie Land-theme air horn.

In what could have been a scene from 80s TV show ‘The Dukes of Hazzard’, the car was stopped whilst the couple were on their way from Portland Castle where they had got hitched to a country music reception in an old barn.

Mr Duke, from Wimborne will now appear in court to answer the charge of sounding the illegal horn.

Dorset Police had been dealing with another incident in the area at the time when they heard the horn. They caught up with the car outside the Army Camp in Chickerell. Mr Duke opened the car’s bonnet so the system could be inspected.

Mr Duke assumed his horn was legal as his car was earlier than 1973. He was informed by Dorset Police that repeating tune horns could only be used by emergency services.

Mr Duke said: “I do have a normal horn but as it’s such a fun car that everybody loves the ‘Dixie Land’ horn and plead with me to sound it, which I did as I was driving Paul and Ali to their reception a couple of times”.

Paul, 43, said: “We were really shocked when we realised that the police flashing lights were for us.

“They must have been chasing us through a great deal of traffic to get to us. When he asked Wayne to open the bonnet it all started to look very serious. I thought he would have given him a warning. I didn’t think it would be a full summons.

“I have to say it did make a talking point at the wedding and I think we will always remember the day when our wedding car was stopped by one of Boss Hogg’s boys. They didn’t even apologise to Ali on her big day.”