Student chandelier fined

Press, 17 December 1982, Page 17

Student chandelier fined

From

DIANA DEKKER,

London correspondent i A British student, decor- 1 ated like a Christmas tree, 1 leapt off a 76m-high suspension bridge over the River s Avon near Bristol “to i brighten up a Christmas 1 evening,” magistrates have i been told in a Bristol court. i Unfortunately, Geoffrey s Carew, aged 20, who had 1 intended to end up in a boat rowed by two friends in the j river below, caught the v elasticised rope to which he v was attached in the beams of y the bridge. (| Carew, the court was told, p was left dangling, decorated a by batterv-nowered car p

lights, over the Avon. It was more than an hour before, a police rescue team hauled him to safety. Defending Carew on the subsequent charge of breaching the peace, Mr Graham Kean said: “This was a well intentioned stunt which went wrong. It was quite a seasonal sight as he hung there like a sparkling chandelier.” Carew and two fellow Bristol University students who had manned the boat were each bound over for a year in the sum of £lOO (SNZ227) and were ordered to pay £2O (SNZ4S) costs after admitting breaching the peace.

Carew had to pay £3O (SNZ6B) towards police equipment lost in the rescue. After the hearing, he said he had got the idea from his brother who had once jumped off the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco. ■