The Courts Driver found guilty

Press, 5 December 1979, Page 4

The Courts Driver found guilty

A meteorologist was on< of the six witnesses caller ; by the defence yesterday it the trial in the Supremt Court of a driver chargee with the theft of three car tons of turkeys from con tainers he was transporting from Rangiora to Lyttelton. After a two-day trial be fore Mr Justice Somers ant a jury. Barry John Weastell aged 29. was found guilty ol the charge of theft of the three cartons, valued al $127, at Lyttelton on Augusi 7 while he was a servant ol Refrigerated Freight Lines Ltd. His Honour remanded the accused in custody to December 14 for a probatior report and sentence. The jury took an hour and a quarter to reach its verdict. Mr G. K. Panckhurst appeared for the Crown, and Mr W. G. G. A. Young, with Mr M. S. Wilson, for the ac{cused. The meteorologist, Noel David White, chief technical officer at the Meteorological Office at Christchurch Airport, was called to give evidence relating to the weather conditions on the morning of the offence, when snow fell in the city. Six witnesses, including the accused, were called by the defence, the Crown's case was completed on Monday. The accused said in evidence that he went to Rangiora to load two containers of turkeys for Auckland. He received help from staff of the Rangiora firm, Poultry Processors, Ltd. The cartons, each containing three turkeys, were difficult to stack because of the nature of the contents and because the cardboard was

'flimsy and liable to fall apart if handled too many I times. The weather that day was : also very cold, snow having fallen during the morning, land there had been eight stops during the loading to ; enable the girl checker to I “warm up.” The accused said melting i snow was dropping off the container roof when the back row was being stacked and "we wanted to get the I job over and done with pretity quickly.” . ’ He said it was a frequent | occurrence for tallies of cartons to be wrong. The accused said that on 'his return to his firm's yard he checked the temperature, and unsealed the containers : to make a visual inspection. ; His understanding of com- | pany policy was that all containers had to be checked before they left the yard. He found the contents had I settled down in the back. He decided to check the i load again at Lyttelton and removed the cartons, which seemed to be extra, from the back rows. He placed two 'cartons in his cab and one in the toolbox. He thought Mr Hollman, another driver, would be rostered for the Rangiora trip the next day and so told him he had some turkeys to be sent back to Poultry Processors. Mr Hollman pulled his truck alongside and a carton was put inside the cab. Another carton was in his truck’s cab when Mr Browne, the firm’s manager,! came over, said the accused. He panicked, thinking that Mr Browne had seen what was going on. and put the carton in the boot of his car. He had wanted Mr Holl-1 man to return the turkeys! to Rangiora and wanted to keep it quiet from his employers as he had received a memorandum sevetal months before about row counts being wrong. In wirtten depositions: read to the Court.’ Maurice John Hollman, now living in Australia, said he took the carton of turkeys from the accused as he thought he would be doing the Rangiora trip the next day. He assumed there was only one carton. He did not hear the accused’s exact comments because of the noise of a forklift truck < working nearby. He had dri-

ven to the refrigerated container area, intending to store the carton overnight. In his final submissions for the Crown. Mr Panckhurst said the case was one of blatant theft as a servant. The accused had been caught red-handed, disposing of one carton to the driver, Mr Hollman, and with another in his car boot for his own use, and a third placed in his truck’s toolbox. Mr Young said that quite obviously most drivers did not adhere to the firm’s drivers’ manual and make a

visual examination of theii container loads. However, the accused was particular about his work. He was the recipient ol the Canterbury "Driver ol the Year” and last year hac a pride in his work Mr Young said the snow falling front the containers, while they were being loaded at Rangiora. tended tc explain why the last few rows were packed roughly. He also referred to the evidence front witnesses of the '‘frequency” of tally disputes in the container loads.