Couple face jail for allowing drunk guest to drive

A French couple are facing a possible jail sentence today for letting a party guest drive while drunk.

The guest, 29-year old Frederic Colin, crashed his car and was killed on the way home – killing a family of four in another car in the process.

But the accused couple had done all they could to stop their friend driving and should not be punished, according to prosecutor Michel Senthille, who now says they should be allowed to go free.

The twist came at the end of a landmark legal case which has split France - should party hosts be responsible for the actions of those to whom they supply alcohol?

Mr Senthille told the court in Nancy the case raised questions about the evolution of society and collective responsibility.

The legal action was brought against Jean-Sebastian and Angelique Fraisse by grandmother of the accident victims, who said the couple were guilty of “failing to prevent a crime”.

The case has caught attention also because the accused couple have both been victims of drunk drivers – and 29-year old Angelique has been confined to a wheelchair for 13 years after being run down by a car.

Originally the prosecution said the couple’s own experiences should have made them more alert to the dangers of letting someone they knew to be drunk drive home at 4am They should have called the police, at the very least, said the victims’ relatives.

What the couple did do, the trial was told, was argue with Mr Colin when he tried to go home. They offered him a bed for the night. Mrs Fraisse even locked the doors to prevent him leaving. But she gave up when he became aggressive and and insisted on going home.

Soon afterwards he was dead – driving at speed the wrong way along a motorway until he crashed head-on into another car containing a young couple and their three sons, aged five, four and 20 months. Only the five-year old survived.

Jean-Sebastian, 31, and Angelique had done their best to prevent their friend leaving, the prosecutor acknowledged, and they should allowed to go.

The accused couple’s lawyer, Bruno Zillig, had argued throughout that “a person can only be (legally) responsible for his own behaviour”.

However, a lawyer for the grandmother of the victims described the couple as “the first link in the security chain which could have saved them”.

Conviction would have meant a hefty fine or a five year prison sentence – and a new French legal slant on responsibility for drunk driving, which is becoming increasingly frowned upon socially across a country in which bar owners can already face legal proceedings if they let a drunk customer drive.