A father of three who brawled with police after a lengthy drinking binge has received a novel warning about any repeat performance.
"Offend again and hi ho, Milton [Otago Corrections Facility] here you go," Judge Kevin Phillips told 27-year-old Steven Moataane.
On October 20, the defendant was drinking with friends in South Dunedin.
"They started on beer and somebody pulled out a bottle of brandy and that was consumed as well," defence counsel Ann Leonard said.
"Though he doesn’t drink regularly, when he does drink, he drinks far too much and finds it difficult to stop."
The binge continued until 7am the following day when Moataane was so drunk he was trying to fight his friends, the Dunedin District Court heard this week.
"You got so plastered, even your mates were sick of you," Judge Phillips said.
Such was their frustration they called police, but their introduction did little to soothe the defendant.
Moataane yelled in the faces of attending officers after they tried to calm him.
Eventually he was arrested for disorderly behaviour.
By the time they got to the police station, Moataane’s rage was still bubbling.
While being transferred to a cell, he refused to remove a rubber wristband and punched a constable in the jaw.
Two officers tried to restrain the man as he resisted; another used pepper spray on the defendant.
While it was aimed at Moataane, the constable herself became incapacitated by the spray, the judge said.
Ms Leonard said her client had "absolutely no recollection of it whatsoever".
Judge Phillips said there were different types of alcoholics.
Not all of them were "on the booze every night ... More regularly than that are people who drink, have a couple of beers and they cannot stop".
The court heard Moataane had not consumed alcohol in four months since the incident.
The judge acknowledged his abstinence but said there was more to it.
"The issue is you have a beer, and another 48 afterwards," he said.
Moataane was sentenced to three months’ community detention, 120 hours’ community work and nine months’ supervision.
He was ordered to pay each of the three police officers involved $200.
