MOTOR DRIVER CHARGED

Press, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23203, 14 December 1940, Page 17

MOTOR DRIVER CHARGED

♦ — FATAL NEGLIGENCE ALLEGED

The evidence of lay witnesses occupied most of the hearing of the case of negligent driving, causing death, which was brought against Sydney Archibald Church, a motor-driver, of Southbridge, in the Magistrate’s Court, before Mr E. C. Levvey, S.M., yesterday afternoon, Three police officers will give the remaining evidence, which is to be taken on Tuesday afternoon. Detec-tive-Sergeant J. McClung is conducting the case for the police, and Church is represented by Mr E. S. Bowie. The case arises from a collision between a car driven by Church and a motor-cycle, ridden by Arnold Cecil Carl Ridden (who was killed), on the Leeston-Southbridge road, near the Roman Catholic cemetery. Constable J. B. Kearton, official police photographer, and George Cheviot Osborne, registered architect, produced photographs and plans of the locality. „ „ , , Dr. E. W. Hunt and Dr. W. G. Volckman told of the condition of the injured men when they were called to the scene of the accident. Ridden was already dead, they said. Dr. Volckman said Church had shock and head injuries. “In my opinion he was sober,” he said. He added that there was a faint suggestion of alcohol about accused. . ' ■ Evidence similar to that given by them in the perjury cases arising out of the accident (reports of which appear in “The Press” yesterday and today) was given by the following witnesses;— Joseph Lester Clark, Allan Osborn Stapleton, Arthur Vince, .and Constable William Nesbitt. Thomas Laurence Marsh, who remained at Church’s home while the others went Ho Leeston, said they were “all right” when they left him. Constable J. E. Hart, of Southbridge, gave evidence on observations after the accident. . „ _ . George Ridden and Albert Douglas Ridden, father and brother of the dead man respectively, said he was in good health when they saw him before the accident. He had a motor-cycle as mr back as 1930, but had ridden one only occasionally since then. He had had the present one about a month. Evidence that he saw Ridden before he left Southbridge about 10.15 p.m., was given by Vincent Hector McEvedy. He was then sober, McEvedy said. Percy Frederick Spicer, a teamster of Southbridge, recalled Ridden Passing him, going towards Leeston, about three-quarters of a mile on the Southbridge side of where the accident took place. This was at about 10.30 p.m. Ridden was travelling about 30 miles an hour. The barman of the Leeston Hotel, George Wallace White, said he filled some jars with beer during the evening, thinking they were for boarders. He was not sure if they were for accused. Later, with the licensee, he went to the scene of the accident. The police were there then. James Simpson, managing director of the Ellesmere Transport Company, which employed Church, said he noticed that the right front tyre of the car was flat after the accident. _ Details of his investigations as insurance assessor and of the observations and measurements he look at the scene of the accident, were being taken from Douglas Barrett Smith when the Court adjourned late in the afternoon. The hearing will continue on Tuesday at 2.30 p.m. Church was allowed bail on the same terms as before.