Drunken drive costs Gégé dear
Russian citizen and seemingly non-stop working actor Gérard Depardieu was convicted by a Parisian court on Friday and was fined €4,000. He also had his driving licence revoked for a period of six months for having been found driving in a state of alcoholic inebriation on his scooter in Paris in November 2012.
The French film star ran the risk of a maximum fine of €4,500 and theoretically, his punishment could have stretched as far as two years in prison. He was found to have a blood-alcohol level of 180mg per litre of blood (as in Ireland, the legal limit in France is 50mg/litre) on the day in question.
Depardieu hadn’t bothered to turn up for both the initial hearing in Paris on the 24th of May and the one on Friday and the presiding judge slapped a €4,000 fine and six-month ban on the actor.
The reason given for absence at the trial was that he was on location in Chechnya. State prosecutor Aurélia Devos commented that “it’s always very frustrating when a defendant who disputes the facts of the case isn’t there to be interrogated directly. It’s regrettable and it’s pitiful.”
The legal proceedings involving 64-year-old Depardieu’s drunken scooter spin have already been put off three times, mostly because of his absence. The actor is indeed a busy man and said that he has been seeking a seventh passport from the Algerian authorities.