ACCIDENT- AT PETONE

Evening Post, Issue 12, 14 July 1936, Page 11

ACCIDENT- AT PETONE

DAMAGES. CASE ADJOURNED

'An adjournment to allow further evidence regarding the erection of a scaffolding to be sought by the defence was granted by his Honour Mr. Justice Johnston in the Supreme Court today, when the claim for "damages brought by Leonard Philip Parker Double, a Petone carpenter " who was injured when scaffolding on which he was working collapsed, against August Victor Swanson, a builder and conr tractor, of Wellington, was resumed.

Mr. P. J. O'Regan, appeared for the plaintiff, and Mr. H. F. O'Leary, K.C., with him Mr. E. D. Bluhdell, for the defendant. Double was injured on January 9, 1935, when he was employed by the defendant on the Todd Motors building, McKenzie Street, Petone, and claimed £750 general damages and £439 15s special damages.

At the completiin of the evidence after "The Post" went to press yesterday, Mr. O'Regan made three submissions: First, that negligence ■ had been established in that a retaining pin that would have stopped the bracket falling from the wall had not been, placed in the hole provided; second,' that the maxim of res ipsa loquitur (the facts spoke for themselves and threw the; onus of disproving negligence on to the defendant) applied to the case; and, third, if those submissions were unacceptable, that the evidence disclosed that the accident was due to the negligence 'of a fellow-worker, in which case the plaintiff would be entitled by law to a lesser sum than he had claimed.

When the case ( was continued today, Mr. O'Leary submitted that the matter had to be decided on a standard of reasonable care being exercised by the defendant,, not on the standard of an accident haying to be prevented by him in any circumstances.

After counsel had discussed the importance of deciding who actually erected the scaffolding, the case was adjourned for one week to allow the defence to seek further evidence ■on that point.