Repeat DUI offender on radio show instead of in court John Dolan said he was in Sweden and had not been told of his S. Jersey hearing. A warrant was issued.

An hour before he was due in a Burlington County courtroom on his latest drunken-driving charge, John "Digger" Dolan went on the air yesterday morning, telling a Philadelphia radio station that he was in Sweden, on business related to the war on terror.

Dolan's excuse for skipping court? Nobody sent him a notice.

"I am on business - preplanned and prepaid business," Dolan told Michael Smerconish of WPHT-AM (1210). "I do not run from the law."

In Westampton Township Municipal Court, Judge Richard E. Andronici thought otherwise. He looked into the gallery and wondered why Dolan, who often drives a Mercedes, was any different from the other defendants - who had shown up to answer the charges against them.

"He elected to go to work rather than come to court," the judge remarked - and issued a warrant for Dolan's arrest.

No mention was made in court of Dolan's radio interview, in which he said he was doing antiterror work and said The Inquirer had erred in articles about him. He gave no specifics.

Thus did the saga of Dolan, who prefers the nickname "Digger," grow to include two arrest warrants, two states - and, apparently, two countries.

As The Inquirer reported last week, Dolan, 44, has had a Pennsylvania congressman's help in seeking federal business; he also has a long drunken-driving record and often touts government connections when police stop him. The other arrest warrant was issued last week in Delaware County when Dolan missed his sentencing in a 2002 drunken-driving case.

Yesterday morning, Dolan's lawyer, Mark Bernstein, gave the court a copy of a boarding pass to Stockholm and a flight itinerary he said was faxed to him from overseas Friday. He said Dolan, of Wilmington, had told him that he received no written notice of yesterday's court proceeding and would return to the United States in February.

Municipal Prosecutor Ted Rosenberg, who asked that the arrest warrant be issued, said Dolan booked his flight after his Oct. 2 arrest on the New Jersey Turnpike. A trooper pulled him over after clocking his white Mercedes-Benz E300 at more than 90 m.p.h. Dolan refused to take a breath test.

"He had actual notice of the court date when he got the ticket," Rosenberg said. "Whatever plans he made thereafter would not have superseded his notice of the court date."