Bartender Found Guilty of "Manslaughter" After Customer Dies Drinking 56 Shots

A French bartender was given a four month suspended sentence for allowing a customer to down 56 shots in a drinking contest that eventually resulted in his death.

Bartender Gilles Crepin, 47, was given a suspended sentence for manslaughter when he admitted in an earlier hearing that he was guilty of putting a 'shots record' on the notice board.

This then encouraged the victim Renaud Prudhomme, 56, to drink out of control who then required help to be taken to his home in Clermont Ferrand last October.

While he spent the evening with his daughter, his family members soon became worried of his inebriated state and called emergency services. He died a day later of "bronchial inhalation alcoholic coma" in hospital.

On Thursday, the judge banned Crepin from working in any bar for a year.

His lawyer Renaud Portejoie however feels the ruling was "a decision guided by emotion and the unconscious desire to set an example" and plans to appeal the verdict.

He goes on to point out how it was Prudhomme's daughter who encouraged her father to break the bar's drinking record and felt she should be made to share most of the blame since Crepin was completely unaware of his existing respiratory problem or history of alcohol abuse.

He goes on to add, "We can't ask every customer who buys alcohol to present their medical certificates."

The lawyer representing Prudhomme's daughter maintains that she was not present at the bar during the competition.

"We want to remind some professionals that it is illegal to serve alcohol to clients that are in an advanced state of inebriation," he concluded.