Coro's Rita on drink-drive charge

Barbara Knox has been charged with drink-driving.

Coronation Street actress Barbara Knox - who plays Rita Sullivan - has been charged with drink-driving in Cheshire.

The 80-year-old was arrested in the Knutsford Police Station after going to visit her daughter, Maxine Ashcroft (56) who had just been arrested for the same offence.

A Cheshire police spokesman said Knox, of Knutsford, Cheshire, would appear before Macclesfield Magistrates' Court on 24 April.

This week, Knox's daughter, of Gloucestershire, was banned from driving for two years and fined 960 ($1850) and ordered to pay costs totalling 181 after admitting drink-driving, the Daily Mail reported.

Macclesfield magistrates heard Ashcroft was arrested after being stopped by police while driving home a relative, believed to be Knox, from a family gathering.

Ashcroft's celebrity defence lawyer Nick "Mr Loophole" Freeman said the divorcee had made a "terrible error of judgment" in what was a "classic case of alcohol anaesthetising good sense".

The Mirror reported that Knox, who has been on Coronation Street for more than 40 years, went to Knutsford Police Station in Cheshire to demand Maxine's release after her arrest, and allegedly yelled, "Do you know who I am?"

She was arrested after police suspected she had driven to the station while drunk.