Band Member Is Found Guilty of Drunk Driving : Courts: Guns N’ Roses keyboardist Darren Reed is sentenced to five days of community service and fined $1,515. Jury foreman calls it ‘a tough case.’

Darren (Dizzy) Reed did not show up Thursday to hear a Ventura County Municipal Court jury decide he was guilty of drunk driving.

His lawyer said the Thousand Oaks resident was too busy rehearsing with his band, Guns N’ Roses, to attend the court proceedings. California law allows attorneys to stand in for their clients during misdemeanor verdict readings.

The 32-year-old keyboard player for the popular rock band had attracted throngs of fans and curious county workers during the three-day trial.

Two California Highway Patrol officers testified that they saw Reed’s Chevy Blazer moving slowly in the emergency lane of California 23 in Thousand Oaks about 4 a.m. Feb. 9. The truck stopped in the lane, the officers testified, and Reed got out of the driver’s seat.

Shortly after he was arrested, Reed registered a 0.25% blood alcohol level, more than three times the legal limit.

Reed never denied he was drunk. But he maintained that his roommate was driving as they headed back to their home on Country Club Road in Thousand Oaks. Jurors deliberated for more than six hours over two days before deciding what to believe.

“It was a tough case,” jury foreman Darrel Banks said. The testimony of the two young CHP officers was often contradictory, and some of their reports were incomplete.

“We chalked it up to their inexperience,” fellow juror Helen Craig said.

Municipal Court Judge Burt Henson sentenced Reed to five days of community service and fined him $1,515. Reed also must attend alcohol education classes. Most drunk drivers serve their community service by picking up trash along the county’s highways, Deputy Dist. Atty. Mike Flory said.

During the trial, Reed testified that he could not remember most of the events the night he was arrested because he was so drunk.

Reed said he drank whiskey and beer during band practice in North Hollywood before driving to the Yucatan Cantina in Westlake, where he drank more beer and a liqueur.

Prosecutors alleged that Reed continued to drink after the bar closed at 2 a.m., but bar manager John Taylor refused to answer a prosecutor’s questions about after-hours drinking. It is illegal for bars to serve alcohol after 2 a.m.

The jury decided that Reed was driving and that he pulled over to let his friend vomit.