INTOXICATED DRIVERS

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 115, 11 November 1935, Page 10

INTOXICATED DRIVERS

AND MOTOR ACCIDENTS

MAGISTRATE'S SHARP COMMENTS

"It is useless for counsel to try to persuade this Court that when a man gets intoxicated in charge of a dangerous machine like a motor-car, lie should be dealt with leniently," said Mr. E. D. Mosley, S.M., in the Magistrate's Court today, when he convicted Mit■chell Lawrence Brown, and fined him £8 and costs for being intoxicated while in charge of a motor-car on Saturday. Brown's licence was also suspended for 28 days. "In face of the record.of deaths last year—lß2 from motor accidents, something; drastic will have to be done by the Courts," added the Magistrate. _ "It is useless to persuade the Court Uiat it should be other than drastic in its punishment. When you come to think of the loss that the country sustains through motor accidents, it is tremendous. It will have to be modified in some manner by either legislation or the Courts."

The Magistrate said Brown was quite frank in his conduct to the police, and he had also taken into consideration the fact that he had pleaded guilty. Brown, a salesman, aged 39, who was represented by Mr. T. P. McCarthy, pleaded guilty to the charge. Senior-Sergeant J. Dempsey said that shortly after 6 o'clock on Satvtrday night the accused came out of a hotel with two friends and got into his car. He drove slowly along' Molesworth Street and struck a bicycle parked against a post. When spoken to by a constable he admitted that he was I under the influence of liquor. He was ! not in a fit state to drive a car when examined by a doctor at 6.45 p.m. The accused was' frank about the matter, and said he recognised he should not [be driving a car. I Mr. McCarthy said that Brown called in at a hotel on Saturday afternoon with two friends and had a few drinks. He had not been drinking earlier in the j day. In pulling out from the kerb in his car he struck a bicycle parked against a' post. He was going very slowly at the time, and stopped immediately. When the constable said something about not being fit to drive the car, he admitted that that was so. Counsel asked that the accused's licence should not be 'interfered "with, as he was employed as a salesman, and had to drive long distances in the country. If his licence was suspended his'employment would be jeopardised. He had been driving a car for the last fifteen years, and had not been in trouble with the police.