Tue Aug 10 2004 10:55:31 ET
The bus driver for rock star Dave Matthews called from the road Monday to say his luxury coach was not the one responsible for dousing passengers on a Chicago River tour boat with foul-smelling muck over the weekend.
CHICAGO TRIBUNE reports: Witnesses on the architectural sightseeing cruise told police they saw a long black tour bus dump liquid waste Sunday afternoon as their boat crossed under the Kinzie Street bridge.
About two-thirds of the passengers seated on the upper deck of Chicago's Little Lady were soaked with the "brownish-yellow" substance.
One witness gave Chicago police an Oregon license plate number that belongs to the 2003 Monaco Royale Coach driven by Jerry Fitzpatrick, who has been Matthews' tour bus driver for three years.
Fitzpatrick confirmed he was in Chicago with Matthews, whose band played the second of two shows at Alpine Valley in Wisconsin later that night. But the driver said he was parked in front of the Peninsula Hotel, 108 E. Superior St., when the waste rained down from the bridge several blocks away.
"There is no way I could be responsible for that," Fitzpatrick said from downstate Effingham. "I haven't emptied the tank for days. Besides, we are very cautious about how we do that sort of thing."
To bolster his case, Fitzpatrick coaxed Sgt. Paul Gardner of the Effingham Police Department to inspect the bus. He then gave Gardner his cell phone to tell a reporter that the tank was nearly full.
"One of the strangest requests I've ever had, that's for sure," Gardner said.
A publicist for the Dave Matthews Band issued a statement Monday night saying the group's management had "determined that all of the buses on our tour were parked at the time of this incident."
Developing.
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