Instant jail for drunken ride into quake cordon

File photo / NZH

A man's drunken bike ride that took him inside the Christchurch central city cordon has led to a sharp jail term.

Aaron Blair Peoples, 33, a sickness beneficiary, admitted a charge of being found inside the central city cordon in Cranmer Square.

He had been held overnight since his arrest at 8.30pm and appeared at the court house at Rangiora where Christchurch cases are being dealt with today, while the Christchurch court house is off-limits.

Peoples had gone to his damaged house in Huntsbury Hill, drank a lot, and then somehow bicycled into the city and through the cordon, so drunk that he could not remember how he got there.

Defence counsel Andrew McCormick thought he may have been heading back to a family house in St Albans.

An ambulance crew found in him Cranmer Square injured and needing stitches to a cut eyebrow.

District Court Judge Tony Couch said the legislation was there to protect people and property and he was suspicious of Peoples' explanation that he could not remember the trip.

He had taken the time and resources of emergency services that had other work to do, but there was no suggestion he was intending to commit a crime.

He jailed Peoples for 14 days.

Peoples had asked to have the case dealt with immediately, because otherwise he faced a likely two-month remand in custody with others charged with earthquake-related offences.

A teenager is getting sent out of town after allegedly burgling a bar in New Brighton.

He was one of two teenagers caught and charged with attempting to break in to Bar 25 in New Brighton Mall yesterday.

The other alleged offender was dealt with at a Youth Court session before Judge Couch.

Rangi Tiari Adrian Wallace-Tapine, who is 18, was dealt with in the District Court at a sitting at Rangiora court house.

Mr McCormick asked for Wallace-Tapine to be released on bail during the remand. He said the teenager was going to travel to Kaikoura with his mother and would continue to have "a measure of supervision" from his mother.

Judge Couch remanded Wallace-Tapine on bail to May 3 on condition that he travel to Kaikoura and stay at a motor camp there.

Police said the two had been caught trying to burgle a bar "in a quake-affected suburb".

Two men arrested and held overnight on charges of being unlawfully in the yard of a property in Belfast say they are innocent and want to plead not guilty.

Defence counsel Tony Garrett said they could be distinguished from those arrested for looting. They had been working for months to clear a property for the building of a supermarket.

Peter Wayne Gear, a 56-year-old labourer from Little River, and Haji Mohemmed Nabi, a 62-year-old labourer from Marshland, said they were legitimately at the property at 8.15pm with a vehicle and trailer.

They gave details to the police, but the owner of the property had never heard of them when the police checked. Police described the house as "damaged".

Gear told Judge Couch that he believed they must have been dealing with someone managing the property. "We are two innocent men here."

The judge released them on bail and remanded them to May 3.

- NZPA