PEDESTRIAN HIT BY CAR

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22335, 24 February 1938, Page 13

PEDESTRIAN HIT BY CAR

•FURTHER EVIDENCE AT INQUEST Futher evidence in the inquest into the death of Louis Arthur Pannell, aged 55 years, a clerk, of Kerr’s road, Wainoni, was heard before the Coroner, Mr E. C. Lewey, yesterday afternoon. No verdict was returned, as the medical witness who was to decribe the injuries and the cause of death was absent on holidays. Pannell died in the Christchurch Public Hospital on January 28 from injuries he received in an accident when he was run into by a motor-car in Wainoni road earlier in the same evening. The car was driven by Anthony Joseph Duggan, a school teacher, of Akitio, Dannevirke, for whom Mr W. R. Lascelles appeared. Mr F. D. Sargent appeared for Pannell’s relatives, and Mr P. H. T. Alpers watched proceedings for the insurance company concerned. Sergeant Murphy conducted the inquiry for the police. Evidence was brought to show that just before Duggan’s car struck Pannell another car had passed Duggan, travelling at a fairly high rate of speed. It was about 8.50 p.m. when the accident occurred, and both cars dipped their lights. Just before the other car passed Duggan the headlights were switched fully and as Duggan switched his on full he felt a bump. Duggan said that he had not been going fast, and pulled up immediately he felt the bump. He did not then know what he had hit, as he saw nothing through having his lights dipped. Other causes for his failure to see Pannell, who was thought to have been walking along the side of the road, were the general darkness of the surroundings and the switching up of the lights of the other car.