Mr Perry claimed he had been driving when his friend called him, and both men pulled over into a carparking area, where Mr Perry accepted an invitation to go to his friend's house. They drank a few RTDs, and at about 9pm, Mr Perry was dropped back to his car by his friend's girlfriend. Before he left, he rang his own girlfriend to collect him from the carpark, which was about 500m from their house.
While he was waiting, Mr Perry put the keys in the ignition, and drank another can while listening to music.
It was then a police patrol came across him.
A constable said he asked Mr Perry had he been drinking and driving, and his response was "yeah".
But Mr Perry denied saying this, and claimed to have told police he was waiting for his girlfriend to collect him.
His girlfriend, named as Ms Weiber in the ruling, said Mr Perry had called her around 9pm asking to be collected. But when she went down about 10pm she was shocked to find his car with his tobacco and phone inside and no sign of her boyfriend.
After walking back to the house, she called 111, and discovered he had been arrested.
At his trial, Judge Rob Ronayne dismissed Mr Perry and Ms Weiber's evidence as "unreliable due to self-interest", and said Mr Perry's evidence was "inherently implausible".
But Mr Perry's lawyer, Annabel Maxwell-Scott, argued Judge Ronayne "failed to turn his mind to this evidence in any analytical way".
And his finding Mr Perry guilty of drink driving meant he concluded Mr Perry had driven to within a few hundred metres of his home, then pulled into the parking area to phone his partner to walk from their home to the carpark to collect him.
"This simply beggars common sense," the ruling records her as saying.
"There has to be a reasonable possibility that Mr Perry, Ms Weiber and [his friend's then-girlfriend] are being truthful and that taken together there is a reasonable possibility that Mr Perry ... was waiting to be collected when the police arrived."
The 111 call proves this, she argued.
Justice Brewer agreed.
"The judge needed to consider that call in the context of Ms Weiber's evidence, and in the context of the evidence of the other defence witnesses. The fact of the 111 call means there was at least a reasonable possibility that Mr Perry had telephoned Ms Weiber before the police arrived to ask her to walk over and collect him. Why would he do that? The only logical reason is that he knew he was too intoxicated to drive legally."
Justice Brewer ruled: "I have decided that one reasonable possibility that remains is that Mr Perry did stop his car at the parking area and go with his friend to consume alcohol. He was returned to his car having telephoned Ms Weiber to come and collect him."
He added: "Otherwise, and I think this is inherently implausible, Mr Perry, driving with more than twice the legal limit for breath alcohol content, chose to pull his car over some 500m from his house and then called his partner to collect him."
Transport law barrister, Stuart Blake, said it was "not uncommon" for people to escape drink driving convictions when found drunk inside their cars. However, it very much depends on the circumstances of each case, he said.
"In this case it seems there were two inferences that could have been drawn - that he drove there or was attempting to drive; or the other inference is what the witnesses are saying were plausible," Mr Blake said.
"When there's two competing inferences the motorist really should be given the benefit of the doubt, because there has to be doubt [for a finding of not guilty].
"In terms of the law, it really depends on the facts [of the case], because there's been instances where people have tried this defence but their car was found in a really isolated rural area, parked in an unusual position on the side of the road, and it's a long bow to draw to get a judge to believe that they got there by some other means," he said.
"Whereas in this case, I think what the High Court is saying is there was another inference that could have been drawn and that wasn't properly taken into account by the District Court."
There were cases where people were found with the engine on, and successfully argued they had only turned it on to warm the engine for the heater, he said.
In Mr Perry's case, he had "a pretty strong defence", Mr Blake said.
"You've got three defence witnesses so it's pretty hard to overlook that I would have thought."
"I think if he'd had no supporting witnesses, there would have been no grounds for appeal," he added, because then it would have come down to the credibility of Mr Perry's evidence versus the police officer's.
DRINK DRIVING LAW:
• The limit for drink driving is 250 micrograms of alcohol per litre of breath, or 50mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood for drivers over 20.
• This lower limit came into effect from December 1, 2014.
• Previously the limit was 400mcg per litre of breath, and 80mg per 100ml of blood.
• For drivers under 20 the limit is zero.
