HUTT ROAD DOUBLE FATALITY

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 198, 19 May 1936, Page 13

HUTT ROAD DOUBLE FATALITY

Mcßeynolds Sentenced TERM OF DETENTION AND DRIVING PROHIBITION The sentence passed by Mr. Justice Blair in the Supreme Court, Wellington, yesterday ou William Mcßeynolds, ship’s fireman, who was found guilty by a jury last week on a charge of negligent driving of a motor-car, thereby causing the deaths of two men on the Hutt Road, was 18 mouths' reformative detention. Prisoner was also prohibited from obtaining a driving license for 10 years. Prisoner’s counsel, Mr. M. G. Neal, submitted three points to his Honour, in pleading for leniency on McReynolds’s behalf. The first was that prisoner’s previous convictions were for theft, and involved premeditation. His Honour: They have nothing to do with motor driving? Counsel: That is my point. His Honour: He has nine convictions for minor offences, and there is one for unlawful conversion of a motor-car, for which he received one month’s imprisonment. Mr. Neal said the second point was that prisoner was a young man who had all his life before him. The third point was that Mcßeynolds had already paid a severe penalty, lu the realisation that he had been responsible for the deaths of two men. He bad seen one lying dead on the road, and had seen the other dying. The memory would remain with him while be lived. "As far as this case is concerned,” said his Honour in passing sentence, ‘‘l shall disregard the minor convictions for theft. Also, the mere fact that there were two deaths and not one is not an aggravating feature, because the offence was the way in which the car was driven. The negligence was of a fairly gross kind. The evidence showed most shockingly bad driving. There was no excuse, and it was straight-out negligence—almost recklessness —and prisoner was driving without regard for the safety of other people on the road. The car was a high-powered machine of whose capacity he was not familiar. I think he had more liquor than was good for him, although he stated that he had only had two drinks.”

Proceeding, his Honour said McReynolds admitted that he had never had a driver’s license, because be feared that he would not get one if he applied ou account of his record. He was constitutionally a person who should not drive a car. Prisoner would be sentenced to reformative detention for a period not exceeding 18 months, and would be disqualified from obtaining a driver’s license for a period of 10 years.