A Glen Innes man who drunkenly hit a cabdriver with a skateboard after refusing to pay was sentenced to a community corrections order this week.
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Dillon Boney was so intoxicated after a lengthy drinking session on Tennessee whiskey on October 12 he can't remember much of the incident, he told Glen Innes police in an interview.
But taxi cameras show the him use a skateboard to hit a Glen Innes taxi vehicle after the driver refused to leave his house empty handed.
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His lawyer described the 22 year old as "completely plastered" after 18th birthday with open bar on the drink, which he was unfamiliar with.
Boney and two women he was with called the taxi at around 6.52am on Sunday October 12.
But when the arrived at a residence on Taylor street, Boney refused to pay and went inside the house.
A minute later he approached the taxi apparently angry the driver hadn't left. He carried a skateboard in both hands.
"What the f**k are you still doing here?" he said to the driver. "Get the f**k out!"
The driver repeated he needed to pay the fare.
Boney raised the skateboard to intimidate the driver.
Then he hit the taxi door pillar with it and with a third blow smacked the driver on his left cheek with the weapon.
In the melee he smashed his victim's portable radio and extensively damaged it, court documents say. The driver was left with slight redness under his left eye by the attack.
The taxi driver fought back, hitting him on the chin, and then left the scene before calling Glen Innes police.
Boney appeared in Glen Innes Local Court on Wednesday facing a charge of destroying property and a count of assault. He confessed to both crimes.
His defence lawyer said the drink-related offence was an aberration, blaming his lack of experience with the hard-hitting whiskey. He said a member of Boney's family had recently died and blamed an unresolved grief issues as well as an anger management problem.
Magistrate Michael Holmes condemned the crime as unacceptable, and said taxi drivers have to be protected lest nobody in Glen Innes be able to order one. But the Magistrate chose not to jail the 22 year old.
Instead he levied a $550 compensation payment, fined him an addition $500 and sentenced him to a 12 month community corrections order with supervision and anger and grief management. A conviction will be recorded.