Drink-driver rear-ended car on highway

A pilot and Queenstown personality was remanded for sentence for drink-driving causing injury, when he appeared in Queenstown District Court.

Ronald Grant Stewart, 50, appeared before Judge Kevin Phillips yesterday charged with driving with a blood alcohol level of 137mg, causing bodily injury on October 21.

Prosecutor Sergeant Penny Stratford said Stewart, who had been drinking at Millbrook resort, was driving with a passenger on State Highway 6 in a 100kmh zone when he rear-ended a car with two passengers. She said the force of the crash caused the front car’s seats to break and topple, leading to the driver and passenger suffering upper body pain that required hospital treatment.

Stewart’s car spun and stopped on the opposite side of the road.

He initially denied he was the driver, telling police an ‘‘unknown person’’ offered to drive the pair back to Queenstown, before admitting he was the driver, she said.

He was remanded for sentence on December 17.