Queenstown District Court
A BELGIAN man’s claim he turned on his van’s engine to warm up the vehicle so he could go to sleep in the back did not wash with a judge in the Queenstown District Court yesterday.
That was the defence employed by Thomas Michel Poullet (31), now living in Ohakune, at his judgealone trial on a charge of drinkdriving in the resort on May 13.
Giving evidence, Poullet said he finished his work shift as a waiter at Skyline Queenstown about midnight, and then went drinking in town with a friend.
About 4am the pair drove to QBox Motor Camp — with his friend driving — and continued drinking in his friend’s rented cabin until 6am.
Poullet then got in his Toyota Estima and switched on the engine with the intention of warming up the cabin and getting in the back to sleep, but he fell asleep while still sitting in the driver’s seat.
The motor camp’s manager, Dean Stuart, told the court he was doing his rounds about 8.45am when he noticed the van sitting in the middle of the lane, blocking the camp’s entranceway, with its engine running.
The defendant was sitting slumped in the driver’s seat, with his foot on the brake, ‘‘completely passed out’’.
When the man did not respond to his knocks on the window, the manager called Queenstown police.
Constable Regan Gray said when he arrived at the scene about 9.25am he got no response from the man despite knocking on the van’s window many times.
When he opened the door and woke the defendant by shaking his shoulder, he was ‘‘disoriented’’, smelled of alcohol, and there were two cans of alcohol sitting in cupholders.
When the defendant turned off the engine, the van rolled forward a short distance because the handbrake was not on.
An evidential breath test at the police station gave a result of 854mcg.
Judge Hobbs told the defendant his evidence was ‘‘implausible’’, whereas the other evidence presented to the court was ‘‘consistent with you leaving the campsite in your van’’.
The van was sitting in the middle of the lane, facing away from the motor camp, with its engine running.
Poullet was convicted, fined $300 and disqualified from driving from six months.
Insanity finding
A man who threw a dead cat at a car while it was being driven on a highway near Queenstown has been found not guilty by reason of insanity.
The former Queenstown man was also found not guilty of intentional damage and offensive behaviour when he appeared by audiovisual link before Judge Peter Hobbs in the Queenstown District Court yesterday.
Judge Hobbs granted the defendant permanent name suppression.
At the time of the offending, which occurred near the resort on April 22, the defendant was ‘‘significantly unwell’’.
That offending was serious and ‘‘placed the public at significant risk’’.
The man was undergoing compulsory treatment and was now stable. It was important he continued that treatment for as long as his clinicians considered appropriate, Judge Hobbs said.