Adrian Sutil charged with grievous bodily harm
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Adrian Sutil has been charged with greivous bodily harm after the incident with Eric Lux at the M1NT club in Shanghai. If convicted, he faces up to one year in prison and a possible ban from entering China. Speculation suggests that this is a major deterrant to Williams signing him for the 2012 season.
He has only been charged, not convicted. Innocent until proven guilty and all that.
But even if Sutil escapes with a suspended sentence – most likely, I’d wager – and even if a team or two out there want his services, he faces a bigger threat: the suspension of his superlicence. When Lewis Hamilton was caught doing burnouts in Melbourne, Jean Todt brought new legistation to bear stating that any driver who brought the sport into disrepute faced the immdiate suspension of his superlicence. It was mostly intended for racing drivers breaking the rules of the road (particularly after the FIA had been pushing on the Make Roads Safe campaign that Todt was running before he became President), but if you can lose your licence for hooning, then you should certainly be able to lose if for GBH.
This happened a long time ago, strange that it only comes up now.
As a fan of Mr Sutil I’d hate to see him get locked up for a small bar brawl,If it’s a first charge it probably wont come to much
This happened a long time ago, strange that it only comes up now.
Actually, it’s not that strange. Sutil would not have been formally charged and summoned to court until the prosecutor built a case. And that prosecutor has probably had dozens of other cases that needed to be resolved before he or she could turn their attentions to Sutil.
As a fan of Mr Sutil I’d hate to see him get locked up for a small bar brawl,
I don’t know what went on or what happened but anyone especially an F1 driver should know better (if the worst is true). I don’t think a bar brawl is ever just a small incident either.
I hope it gets sorted out soon though- one way or the other. The more uncertainty there is the more difficult it will be for a team to sign him and if they do gamble and he’s not allowed into China that’ll just be ridiculous for the sport.
In my opinion, Sutil (like Alonso) is one of the most enigmatic characters on the current grid. It’s hard for me to imagine what is really going on inside his mind.
Adrian is not a typical racing driver. A far as I know, his parents (a Uruguayan and a German) wanted him to become a pianist and he was actually very successful in doing that. If my mind serves me correctly, he used to play concerts in front of relatively large audiences. That is, until the age of 14 when he realised that his feelings for motorsport were stronger.
I have noticed that Sutil always tries to sound / look very masculine. For instance, when asked which movie had made him cry (this question was asked to all F1 drivers in a series of interviews on F1.com) he replied: “I’m not a cry baby.” No other driver emphasized his coolness so much. And this is just one example.
Maybe this fear of being ‘unmanly’ made Sutil attack Lux after the latter one had e.g. laughed at him or whatever. But that’s just an assumption. Anyway, I wish Adrian good luck in the courts and hope that he gets acquitted and spends many more years in F1.
Sutil’s always been an odd one for me. I loved his fake glasses joke on the gridwalk this year – I can’t remember which race it was before – and how he handled Trulli in the 09′ Abu Dhabi press conference, but this whole incident doesn’t really fit in with that persona he projects. As @Girts says, he can be a little enigmatic. The only thing I can say I definitively know about his personal life is that he’s great friends with Lewis Hamilton.
Apart from that, there’s just baseless speculation (edit: I should say, not on my part – I just mean that’s the only other stuff I’ve read about his personal life. I’m not really fussed either way!) on his sexuality – which, unfortunately, doesn’t help the rumours that Lux made a joke at Sutil’s expense and that a girl was also allegedly involved in the Shanghai incident.
All in all, I’m just left feeling not sure who I’m meant to feel sorry for!
I imagine regardless of the outcome, unless its innocent (which based on the limited knowledge I have of the incident seems unlikely) I would imagine that he would have his super-licence taken away or at the very least suspended for bringing the sport into disrepute as grievous bodily harm is a rather serious matter and if doing a few burnouts qualifies then this definitely would.
@jarred-walmsley – I think a lot of that decision will come down to the outcome of the trial. If Sutil were to be found not guilty, or if he were acquitted of the charges, then I think the FIA would be hard-pressed to justify suspending his licence because the court would have ruled it an accident. I think that the FIA would only really suspend his licence in the event the court decided it was pre-meditated, though Sutil would likely face a jail sentence (rather than a suspended one). As @Girts and @the-hundredth-idiot have pointed out, Sutil seems to be very self-consicious of his image, and that he has had to endure a lot of speculation that he is gay (most of this seems to stem from the way he’s never really had a high-profile girlfriend). I’m not sure how much the court would take it into account, but since it was a nightclub, that implies there was alcohol involved, and if Eric Lux insulted or humiliated him and Sutil simply lashed out in the heat of the moment, then I think the FIA would be hard-pressed to suspend his licence, particularly if the courts recognised as much.
I’m more surprised at the fact that donig burnouts is supposedly bringing the sport into disrepute. What sort of logic went into deciding that?!
All I hope for is a correct verdict. If he did it, he deserves to be punished. If not, then it’s unfortunate, but his career may be ruined if he can’t find a seat this year.
I’m more surprised at the fact that donig burnouts is supposedly bringing the sport into disrepute. What sort of logic went into deciding that?!
Because Hamilton was charged with a criminal offence. Doing burnouts on a public road is considered hooning under Australian law, and the Victorian government is notorious for its stance on it. They really go for the jugluar in these cases. Because Hamilton was charged, it made headlines around the world – bad headlines, made all the worse by the way he was doing it after leaving the circuit. And with the teams and drivers supporting the FIA’s Make Roads Safe campaign – which aims to discourage this kind of behaviour – the FIA decided that Hamilton’s actions had brought the sport into disrepute. Maybe he wouldn’t have been charged if he was in England, but he wasn’t in England. He was in Australia, which means he had to abide by our laws. And our laws are very strict on this matter, since there have been several cases of irresponsible driving – like drag racing and hooning – have led to deaths.
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