Motorist’s trial continues in double fatality case

Press, 19 August 1981, Page 4

Motorist’s trial continues in double fatality case

Crown evidence in charges against a motorist in relation to a double fatality involving a car and a motor-cycle was completed late yesterday on the second day .of a trial in the District Court.

The defendant, Gary William McQuillan, aged 26. a painter, has elected trial by jury on two charges of causing the deaths of Grant Findlay Perry, aged 31. and Teress’a Joan Ayers, aged 16, by driving in a dangerous manner on the Main South Road. Hornby, late on the evening of November 29.

He' has denied both charges. Judge Pain adjourned the case to today, when the case for the defence will open. Mr P. M. James appears for the defendant, and Mr P. G. S. Penlington, Q.C., with Mr A. M. Mclntosh, for the Crown.

Gary Kenneth Brooks, a carpenter, gave evidence of being second in a group of motor-cyclists, who were travelling in staggered formation at 30 miles an hour.

Just after the Hornby Police Station, “Shane" Toonen began overtaking motor-cyclists ahead of him. While he was doing this the witness noticed an approaching car. The car was half a lamp-post distant when Shane’s machine had straightened up at the front.

The car “baulked” twice towards its incorrect side, the second time going about three to five feet over to the motor-cyclists' side.

Mr Brooks said the car "just about wiped me out" as it went past, and he then heard a. big bang. He returned' to the scene to see the bodies of Mr Perry and Miss Ayers on the road.

The witness said he saw no reason for the car to baulk. There was nothing in its path on its correct side of the road.

He estimated the car's speed'at 60 miles an hour. The motor-cyclists were travelling at 30 to 35 miles an hour.

Under cross-examination Mr Brooks was asked if the sight of a motor-cyclist overtaking, with two to three car lengths to spare, could cause the car driver to fear for his safety. He said no, as the overtaking had been completed. Any movement by the car driver should have been to his left, not to his right.

Mr Brooks said that inside the house, when the defendant was spoken to, he did not hear any threats made to the defendant by- any of his group.

Another motor-cyclist, Murray Rex Coburn, a car painter, said he considered Shane Toonen’s overtaking manoeuvre had been done quite safely. He had had plenty of time to get back to the left side.

After completing the overtaking Mr Toonen was 70 yards ahead of the others. The oncoming motorists then seemed to swerve to give Mr Toonen a scare.

After “swinging the wheel

at him" the motorist returned to his correct side but then began crossing -to its wrong side again. The car went diagonally across the road and behind the witness’s machine. He then heard a collision.

Before the accident the car had passed within sft of. the witness.

Hillis Adrian Lapthorne, an Ashburton storeman said he followed behind the group of motor-cyclists and a utility vehicle from the saleyards in Blenheim Road to Hornby. He could not fault the motor-cyclists’s riding. At Hornby he saw an approaching car which appeared to be on a collision course with the utility vehicle. A collision occurred. Cross-examined, he said he did not see much of what happened to the motorcyclists after the Hornby traffic lights. He was watching the utility vehicle immediately ahead.

Mark Denis Ryan, a storeman. and driver of the utility vehicle accompanying the motor-cyclists, said that after the overtaking manoeuvre his attention was attracted to the approaching car. It suddenly swerved completely to its wrong side, and struck Mr Perry’s machine.

Mr Perry and Miss Ayers were thrown from the machine. The approaching car then clipped the witness’s vehicle, which stopped with the motor-cycle jammed beneath it. Mr Ryan

sought help tor the acciuent victims from an adjacent., motel.

In a statement made to Constable P. R. Kench the defendant allegedly blamed the collision on the motorcyclist's failing to keep left.

The statement said that while returning from the Golden Mile he saw “a whole lot" of motor-cycle headlights near Hornby. One motor-cycle was approaching on its wrong side, at a speed he considered to be about 70 miles an hour. His own speed was about 30 to 40 miles an hour.

The defendant’s statement said the motor-cyclist did not return to his correct side, and when about 30m away he tried to swerve to avoid the motor-cycle. He presumed the motor-cyclist swerved the same way, and the collision occurred. The defendant’s statment said he asked nearby residents to call assistance.

While he was washing himself in the resident’s house, a motor-cyclist called and said he had “murdered” two people and asked his name. He was told that if he went outside he would be dead, according to the statement.

Soon afterward, he left the house by a rear door and went on foot across fences and roads before taking a taxi to the city.

He went to a hotel and had "quite a few" 12oz beers because of what had hap-. pened, before telephoning the 1 police.