Man guilty of assaults has ‘allergy’ to alcohol

A London, Ont., man told a judge he was so intoxicated he has no recollection of attacking a cab driver and a random tourist on Clifton Hill. “He was absolutely hammered,” defence counsel V.J. Singh said of his client, Richard King, who pleaded guilty Friday in Ontario Court of Justice in St. Catharines to three counts of assault. “The issue is alcohol, for him,” Singh told Judge Tory Colvin. “He has an allergy to it … he acts in a very, very bad way.”

The judge imposed a sentence of time served — King having served the equivalent of 98 days in pretrial custody — and placed him on probation for two years.

King, 33, was arrested July 22 after a taxi driver called police to report he had been assaulted. The driver said he picked King up at the Sundowner and drove him to Clifton Hill. En route, the defendant fell asleep and when the driver attempted to wake him, he punched the man several times in the face.

As police investigated the assault, they received a call for assistance from the Niagara Parks Police.

In that case, King had approached a tourist standing at a bus stop and, for no apparent reason, punched him in the face.

He was released from custody pending trial and was arrested again Oct. 1 after he attacked a security officer at a Falls Avenue hotel.

Assistant Crown attorney Pat Vadacchino said three unprovoked assaults in a tourist area are “cause for grave concern.”

Court was told King has three previous convictions for assault.