Car Ticketed With Dead Body at the Wheel

Friday, October 21, 2005 5:26:55 AM

SYDNEY, Australia (AP) - A traffic warden slapped a parking ticket on a car which had its dead driver slumped at the wheel outside an Australian shopping mall, an official said Friday.

The body of the 71-year-old man, whose identity was not immediately released, was discovered Thursday in a parking lot in the southern city of Melbourne, The Age newspaper reported Friday.

The man had been reported missing nine days earlier and was known to be seriously ill, the newspaper said.

Nevertheless, a parking officer who inspected the vehicle failed to notice the man inside and issued the parking fine two days before his body was discovered.

Paul Denham, the mayor of Maroondah council, where the man was found, said the parking officer was "distressed" to learn that the dead man had been inside the car.

"Our local laws officer checked and wrote out the ticket at the rear of the vehicle and placed the ticket from the passenger side on the windscreen," Denham said in a statement. "The local laws officer did not notice anything unusual regarding the vehicle, and is extremely distressed to have learned of the situation."