DRIVER FOR TRIAL

Evening Post, Volume CXXIX, Issue 15, 18 January 1940, Page 17

DRIVER FOR TRIAL

SEQUEL TO ACCIDENT

| The. view that a driver who. is involved in a car accident must, stop for a "reasonable" time within a "reasonable" distance of the scene of the accident was expressed by Mr. J. L. Stout, S.M., in the Magistrate's Court yesterday, in hearing a case in which John Joseph Birt, . a plumber, was charged with having. failed to stop after - being involved in an accident with a" car .driyen by.; Robert Alfred Evans, a taxi driver, at the junction |of Buckle and Tarahaki .Streets,, bn. October 25.. "! . .. . ...."' In a. statement made ,to the police on November 2 the .defendant asserted that he had stopped at some distance, from the scene of the accident and had inspected the damage to his own car, which he considered "trivial." He did not get in contact with the driver of the other car, but drove on. Mr. W. P. Pringle, who appeared for the defendant, submitted that the' Act did not say when or where a driver was to stop after an accident - The Magistrate said that "to stpp" meant stopping for a reasonable time and within a reasonable distance of an accident. For a driver to pull up some w) yards away, inspect the damage to his own" vehicle, and then drive on, no matter how trivial he thought the damage, was-not sufficient. Birt was committed for trial at the forthcoming Supreme Court sessions in Wellington. He pleaded not guilty and reserved his defence. Bail was allowed. ■ ■■;,:."■'■

Sub-Inspector E. T. C. Turner prosecuted for the police.

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