Host loses licence after drinker falls into coma

by Phil Pemberton

A Loughborough landlord has been stripped of his licence after a drinking game involving a "dentist's chair" left a student in a coma for three days.

The incident has reignited debate on the limits of licensee responsibility.

Student Ian Overton, 18, visited Magnus Lawson's pub, Smiths in Ward End, Loughborough, in September last year with a large group of students and participated in a drinking game involving a dentist's chair.

Overton had already downed eight pints of strong lager, eight bottles of alcopops and eight shots of spirits in other pubs before he climbed into the chair at Smiths.

Staff poured a further eight units worth of WKD 40 into his mouth and he collapsed unconscious after leaving Smiths.

He was taken to hospital where he was in a coma for three days, but he later made a full recovery.

Last week magistrates at Loughborough stripped Lawson of his licence and ordered him to pay £800 costs, despite the landlord putting up a vigorous defence which included testimony from local licensees and graduate students from the university.

Lawson, an S&N Pub Enter-prises lessee, believes he acted responsibly as the student did not appear overly drunk before the game and was okay when he left.

He said: "I think the law needs looking at because I am not sure where my liability finishes, a student recently left the bar and climbed a lamppost, is it my fault if he falls?

I run a responsible student-friendly pub, but students will inevitably play drinking games and people who are of a legal age must take some responsibility for themselves."

However, Tony Payne, chief executive of the Federation of Li-censed Victuallers Associations, believes drinking games are dangerous and should be discouraged.

He said: "I can't understand any person allowing binge drinking equipment to be used in a public house.

In terms of our liability, of course we cannot control what a person drinks before he arrives at our establishment, but we are legally bound not to serve a drunken person.

The England football players were rightly condemned for their antics in a dentist chair and I would be very upset if any of our members had one."

Lawson will continue to run the pub, but will take on another member of staff to be the licensee.