Police Beat by Tom GeyerDrinking and driving don’t mix, even if you’re on a bicycle
Thursday, July 9th, 2009 8:57 pmTwice this week Davenport police and Davenport firefighters have had to care for a drunk person trying and failing to ride a bicycle.
Tuesday at about 10 p.m. on Myrtle between River Drive and 2nd Street, a drunken bicycle rider fell and was having trouble getting up. He hurt his left wrist. His choices were either to go the hospital and get fixed up, or go to jail. He chose the hospital, specifically, Genesis Medical Center-East Rusholme Street.
On Thursday, on 17th Street at Vine Street, a man had been drinking and was trying to ride his bike, police said. The man failed.
That call came in as a child lying in the middle of the street near his bike. Well, it wasn’t a child. It was an adult, and he left behind him a nice pool of blood. He, too, was taken to Genesis East.
Davenport police say that being drunk on a bicycle is public intoxication, for which people will go to jail, provided they don’t wreck and injure themselves.
July 10th, 2009 at 8:57 am
Public intoxication is illegal? I once worked as a busboy in a local bistro. The cllientele included many lawyers and judges. The worst drunks I have ever seen in my life were judges and lawyers. There was a local judge who came in every night and drank until about midnight, staggered out to his Lincoln and wove his way down the highway. Never got a DUI. The cops would load him and take him home if he got stopped. Must depend on your station in life whether being a drunk is illegal or not.