Man ‘blown up’ with hose during tomfoolery

Press, 14 March 1985, Page 14

Man ‘blown up’ with hose during tomfoolery

A “practical joke which went wrong,” in a Christchurch bakehouse last December, left an employee “blown up like a cylinder,” after a compressed air hose had been used in the area of his anus while he was held down. This evidence was given in the District Court yesterday when two pastrycooks appeared for the preliminary hearing of a charge of injuring Grant Michael Lamport, aged 23, in circumstances that if death had resulted they would have been guilty of manslaughter. After an all-day hearing of depositions of evidence of prosecution witnesses, Mrs C. M. Holmes and Mr C. Fisk, Justices of the Peace, held there was sufficient evidence to commit Kevin Victor Davis, aged 21, and Ronald Phillip Grieve, aged 32, for trial. They remanded the two on bail to March 29, pending a date for trial in the District Court. The defendants were represented by Mr M. J. B. Hobbs. Sergeant G. G. Cleland prosecuted. The charge related to an incident in the bakehouse of .Coupland Pies, Ferry Road, last December 21. Mr Lamport said he began work at 5 a.m. on the day of the incident. He could not recall anything that happened that day. He was discharged from hospital on December 31. He said an air hose in the bakehouse area was used to blow down and clean machinery, and some employees used it to remove flour from their clothing and skin. The admission of some other evidence from Mr Lamport was objected to by Mr Hobbs, and an order was made suppressing this from publication. Trevor Russell Jackson, a foreman at the bakery, said Mr Lamport was reasonably good in his work. He was sometimes treated as a joke by other staff, and encouraged this. Cheek was exchanged among them. Mr Jackson said he was blowing flour off himself, with the air hose, on the morning of the accident. Mr

Lamport was at a table, cutting pastry. Pie-making had finished and there was a bit of byplay, which got more and more serious. The two defendants approached Mr Lamport and grabbed him and put him on the bench. Mr Lamport resisted being pushed over. There was a lot of laughter. Grieve asked Mr Jackson for the air hose and it was handed to him. Grieve then held the air hose towards Mr Lamport’s behind, outside his trousers. He said there was a lot of laughter at first but then it turned a bit sour. Mr Lamport went red in the face, and made a squealing noise. “We saw the situation had got a bit more serious than what we intended. “Grant started to walk on his toes, strangely, towards the toilet. We could see he was not too well. He was bloated round the stomach area.” Everybody rushed over to him and took him to the toilet to try to get some of the air out of him, because he was blown up, but this was not successful. Mr Lamport was groaning, and collapsed when taken outside. Mr Jackson said an ambulance was called, and he applied heart massage. Mr Lamport was barely breathing at that stage, and had turned blue. His stomach was distended. Cross-examined, Mr Jackson said the air hose was usually held two to three inches from the body when blowing flour off. He said he saw Mr Lamport lift up his apron and say something about a “blow job” to Grieve. This was directed at Grieve while the witness still had the hose. He said he did not think the remark had any connection with the hose. The joking atmosphere continued until suddenly it was realised Mr Lamport was going very red in the face. The defendants then showed a lot of concern, and were very upset. Other employees also gave evidence of the incident. Ronald James McKen-

xie Thow, a student, said he saw Mr Lamport being pinned to a table by Davis, with Grieve behind them. He then saw Mr Lamport stand up. He was yelling and appeared in pain. His stomach was blown up like a cylinder. Fay Rose Johnson, a bakehouse assistant, said she heard laughing and giggling and saw Mr Lamport being held on the table. Grieve held the air hose and pulled down Mr Lamport’s trousers and put the air hose in. The witness moved closer and told them it was a stupid thing to do, and not to do it. It was all over in about three seconds. Mr Lamport stood up and went to the toilet. “He looked like a bloke who had the bends. He was blue and his face and stomach were bloated,” Mrs Johnson said. She said Davis reached the office before her, to ask for an ambulance to be called. He was pretty upset. An ambulance officer, David Neville Howley, said that he found, on arrival at the factory, that Mr Lamport was cyanosed and was not breathing and had no pulse. He had a very distended abdomen, and appeared to be in cardiac arrest. Mr Lamport was revived, although he was still unconscious. He was taken to the intensive care unit of Christchurch Hospital. Dr K. G. Hickling, head of the intensive care unit at Christchurch Hospital, said Mr Lamport was admitted to the hospital at 10.45 a.m. on December 31 deeply unconscious and with a grossly distended abdomen. A large amount of air was in body cavities. He was found to have a rupture of the lower bowel, and a portion of his bowel was removed in an operation. Mr Lamport was extremely ill on admission. His neurological state improved quite rapidly, and he made a rapid recovery during the next few days, and was discharged on December 31. Cross-examined, the doctor said the retrograde am-

nesia which Mr Lamport suffered was loss of memory for events about the time of the injury. Detective W. D. Schwass gave evidence of interviewing Davis. In a written statement Davis allegedly said he was rolling pastry and saw Mr Lamport “being himself, and being smart” and pointing his backside at Grieve. Grieve told him that if he did not watch he would “shove this where the sun doesn’t shine.” Both men started laughing. Davis said he grabbed Mr Lamport and forced him down on a table and told Grieve he was “all yours.” He could not see what Grieve was doing but Mr Lamport was laughing. Grieve must have held the hose for two or three minutes and then gave it back to Mr Jackson. Mr Lamport stood up and began making funny noises. They thought he was joking, and did not realise that air must have got into him. Davis’s statement said they joked round all the time and Mr Lamport was a practical joker. It was just the normal thing. Everybody jokes, “except today, when it went wrong.” Detective Sergeant D. M. Quested said that Grieve, when interviewed, said the incident was a practical joke that went wrong. He said Davis had grabbed Mr Lamport and he put the hose up his rear.

In a written statement Grieve said he was blowing himself down with the air hose and Mr Lamport held up his apron, revealing his open fly, and said he would not mind a “blow job.” Davis grabbed him and Grieve put the hose near his backside, for 30 seconds to a minute. Mr Lamport still had his clothes on.

Mr Lamport was not screaming. When Davis let him go he was very tight round the stomach and gasping for air.

Grieve’s statement said it was a practical joke which backfired. He recounted other occasions on which Mr Lamport

had played practical jokes on him. He said he considered Mr Lamport a good friend, and regretted what happened. Mr Hobbs sought the discharge of both defendants, saying that it had been an incident of tomfoolery and a joke to which the defendant, complainant, and others were a party. As soon as the serious consequences were realised, the tomfoolery stopped. The accident could not have been foreseen. The hose was used regularly close to employees’ bodies when thev cleaned flour off.