Depardieu fined in much-postponed drink-driving trial

Gérard Depardieu in France earlier this month Reuters/Eric Gaillard

Film star Gérard Depardieu has been fined 4,000 euros and had his driver's licence suspended for six months for driving his scooter through the streets of Paris while drunk. Depardieu was sentenced in absentia after repeatedly failing to turn up in court.

The maximum possible sentence was two years in jail but prosecutors had asked for a 4,000-euro fine and a 10-month suspension.

Depardieu's lawyer, Eric de Caumont, welcomed the shorter suspension but regretted that his bid to have the case dismissed had failed.

The trial had been put off three times with the accused saying he was unable to attend because he was filming in Russia.

Depardieu, who took Russian citizenship after leaving France due to the government's attempts to temporarily tax incomes over one million euros at 75 per cent, recently said he was applying for an Algerian passport and hoped eventually to have seven nationalities.

In August he was cautioned for punching a motorist who forced him to swerve on his scooter.

In 2011 he shocked fellow passengers by urinating into a bottle in the aisle of an airplane that was taking off from Paris to Dublin.