Jailed for breaking into quake hotel to drink bar dry

Aidan Astwood illegally entered the Christchurch red zone to drink the bar dry inside the 26-storey Hotel Grand Chancellor. Photo / Mark Mitchell

A Christchurch man caught burgling the earthquake-crippled Hotel Grand Chancellor in the city's central red zone was jailed for 18 months when he appeared in court today.

Aidan Astwood, 23, told police he snuck under the red zone perimeter wire to drink the bar dry inside the 26-storey Hotel Grand Chancellor - one of the tallest buildings in the city.

Police say he drank "a large amount" of liquor inside the tower building, which is now being demolished, floor by floor.

The hotel was damaged in the February 22 magnitude 6.3 earthquake, and has been earmarked for demolition by the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (Cera).

The unemployed man was also found by patrolling police officers in the devastated Cashel Mall shopping strip, in breach of the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Act, about 4.30am on October 4.

Astwood was found with a set of keys and security access cards - but police withdrew a charge that he had stolen them.

He appeared from custody at a Christchurch District Court hearing at Rangiora courthouse today after earlier admitting charges of burglary and breaching the cordon.

He was also sentenced for breach of community work and release conditions, as well as a theft and two of causing intentional damage. Judge Jane Farish told him: "You put your own life in danger when you entered into the red zone and entered the Hotel Grand Chancellor. It was destructive behaviour and it put other people in danger too, if anything happened to you while inside.

"Your purpose in entering the building was not to cause damage but you decided to drink as much alcohol as you could find, and you did so. When found by police you were incredibly intoxicated."

Defence counsel Vicki Walsh said: "His offending is triggered by alcohol abuse," which Judge Farish accepted and added: "He's probably got a genetic pre-disposition."

Ms Walsh said her client had been in the city centre when the February 22 earthquake rocked the city.

On October 4, he got drunk and was "drawn back" to the city centre, and entered the Grand Chancellor to "see what was behind" the damaged facade.