Claiming brake failure, a 28-year-old student drove his car into an apartment complex in the 3100 block of Imperial Way on Thursday night. No one was hurt.
"My husband was just about ready to go on his exercising machine, that's right there by that front window," said Cheryl Moore, a six-year resident of the Horseshoe Apartments, as she pointed to the white Pontiac with its nose shoved into her living room.
The car, driven by Norbert Kouakou Yao, a French national, pushed in the front wall, knocking the air conditioning unit inside and damaging the new exercise machine the couple just bought the day before.
Carson City building inspector John Tuttle was called to survey the damage. He found the building structurally sound, but the Moores will be unable to return to their apartment until repairs are made on the wall of their front room. Management at the complex put the couple up in a room at the Days Inn and are considering moving them into another unit altogether.
"I saw orange parking lights and I called (my wife)," said John Moore jokingly. "I said, 'What the hell are those lights doing in here?'"
The couple said Tao was concerned if they were OK and told them his brakes didn't work.
Moore kept his sense of humor.
"I asked him, 'Hey, are you trying to get me or something?'"
Once the inspector said it was OK to move the vehicle, firefighters backed the car out, braking without problems.
Tao received a citation for failure to use due care. He is to appear in court Nov. 5.
