News Toronto & GTAVaive on trial for drunk driving
By TERRY DAVIDSON, Toronto Sun
Former Maple Leafs captain Rick Vaive appeared in a Newmarket court to face driving while impared charges on Feb. 22, 2011. (STAN BEHAL/QMI Agency)
Rick Vaive was unsteady on his feet, smelled of alcohol and had bloodshot eyes the night he was stopped and charged with impaired driving in 2009, a Newmarket court heard Tuesday.
York Regional Police Const. Carl Young said the former captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs was pulled over on the ramp to the southbound Hwy. 427 from Hwy. 407.
Young said he determined Vaive was intoxicated, handcuffed the former NHLer and took him to a police station where he said Vaive failed a breathalyzer test.
Vaive has pleaded not guilty to impaired driving.
Young told the court Vaive, now 51, was slow to pull over in his black pickup truck the night of July 14, 2009, was “delayed in his actions” when handing over his driver’s licence, ownership and insurance, and had a “fair-sized wet stain” in the “crotch region” of his shorts.
Vaive told him he had been at a charity golf tournament and that he had consumed “a beer,” Young testified.
The officer said he was working the night shift when he was alerted a man had called 911 after seeing an unsteady man get in a pickup and drive erratically out of a plaza parking lot near Pine Valley Dr. and Hwy. 7 in Vaughn.
Fernando Bernardo testified he was unaware the man he saw get in the truck was a former NHLer but that he watched as a man made a wide turn in the lot and narrowly miss the end wall of the plaza.
Crown prosecutor Jon Fuller presented video evidence of Vaive being taken out of the cruiser at the police station and being processed in the booking room and while in a cell.
Vaive’s lawyer, Calvin Barry, has entered a charter motion challenging the grounds under which Vaive was arrested and given a breathalyzer test. Barry is questioning the length of time it took for Young to read Vaive the breathalyzer demand, and length of time before the test was given.
He is also challenging that Vaive was not given his choice of lawyer to call.
The trial continues Wednesday.
http://www.torontosun.com/news/torontoandgta/2011/02/22/17367156.html
