FINES TOTAL £100
Hit-And-Run Accident
The action of a youth who failed to stop after hitting a cyclist on the Causeway, Redcliffk, causing injuries which had left the man paralysed from the shoulders down. could only be described as callous, said Sergeant V. F. Townshend in the Magistrate’s Court yesterday. The injured man was married, with children. Brian Augustine Burke, aged 20, a telegraphist employed by the Post Office, was fined £5O for negligent driving causing injury, £25 for failing to stop after an accident and £25 for failing to ascertain if anyone was injured, by Mr E. A. Lee, S.M. His driver’s licence was cancelled for five years. Burke was convicted and discharged for having no warrant of fitness. He pleaded guilty to all four charges. Sergeant Townshend said about 1.30 a.m. on Sunday, October 21, Mr George Goodwin was riding a cycle east along the Causeway The head and tail lights on his cycle were working. He was suddenly struck from behind by a car, flung up on to the windscreen and was then thrown on to the road. The car did not stop and Mir Goodwin was left lying badly injured on the road.
The collision was seen by several persons, who went to the aid of the cyclist. They later said the car was travelling at a high speed which they estimated at 50 miles an hour. Mr G. T. Mahon, who appeared for the accused, said although Burke accepted he must have been involved he still said he was unaware of the accident.
Burke was most co-opera-tive when seen by the police, said Mr Mahon. He was most concerned about the cyclist. About the time of the accident he was working on night shift. He lived with his widowed mother, his father having died when he was a small child.
“It is impossible for me to accept your instructions to counsel that you did not know the accident had happened,” the Magistrate said. ‘‘You ran off and left this cyclist with shocking injuries on the roadside.”
The power of the press is to suppress.—-Lord Northcliffe.
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Bibliographic details
Press, Volume CII, Issue 30045, 1 February 1963, Page 11
Word Count
350FINES TOTAL £100 Press, Volume CII, Issue 30045, 1 February 1963, Page 11
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