Bar Owner Fined $50,000 for Customer’s Drunk Driving

Video camera footage clearly showed that the customer served 5 20-ounce beers in the course of an hour was already visibly drunk when he entered the bar. So, when the customer later smashed into a parked car before killing another driver in a head-on collision, police charged the bar owner with allowing liquor to be sold to an intoxicated person. The bar owner pled guilty to 2 offences carrying a maximum penalty of $250,000 and the Ontario judge had to decide what the fine should be. While the aggravating factors spoke for themselves, including the fact that somebody died, there were also mitigating factors, like the owner’s timely guilty plea, the training it provided staff on the perils of over-serving, its lack of previous offences and its status as a small business. Based on all of this, the judge imposed a fine of $50,000 [R. v. 2460043 Ontario Inc. known as St. Louis Bar and Grill (Cambridge), 2021 ONCJ 515 (CanLII), October 7, 2021].