Court toughens sentence for former Cēsu alus chief over drunk driving

Riga Regional Court has upheld a prosecutor's appeal and increased the additional penalty imposed on Eva Sietiņsone, former chairwoman of the board of brewery Cēsu alus, who was convicted of driving a car while severely intoxicated.

The court panel ruled that a driving ban is a mandatory additional penalty whose length is strictly fixed by the Criminal Law at five years, leaving no room for judicial discretion to shorten it. As a result, the regional court overturned the Riga City Court's earlier ruling, which had suspended Sietiņsone's driving rights for only three years. The rest of the lower court's ruling remained unchanged, and the regional court's decision took effect immediately, as it cannot be appealed.

Background of the case

The prosecutor's appeal also challenged the amount ordered to be recovered over the car involved, a Lexus RX 450h. The vehicle's value was set at 42,495 euros during proceedings, but the lower court had ordered only 20,000 euros to be recovered in favor of the state. The prosecutor had sought 35,000 euros, but the regional court did not grant this part of the appeal, leaving the amount unchanged. The prosecutor had not objected to the base sentence of one and a half years of probation supervision.

The court also ordered Sietiņsone to pay 204 euros in procedural costs related to the blood alcohol test.

The incident occurred in December 2023, when Sietiņsone was driving a Lexus along Krasta Street in Riga, heading toward the Dole shopping center. A test found her blood alcohol concentration at 2.66 per mille, far above the 1.5 per mille threshold at which criminal liability applies under Latvian law. Sietiņsone previously did not deny her involvement in the criminal case but declined to comment further, and denied any connection between it and her departure from the chair position at Cēsu alus, a post she had held since 2004 after serving as deputy board chair from 2002.