CHARGE-FAILS

Hokitika Guardian, 28 April 1939, Page 6

CHARGE-FAILS

NEGLIGENT DRIVING CAUSING DEATH. I.

(Per Press Association —Copyright).

WELLINGTON, April 27. * The case was commenced yesterday in whifcli James Alexander Wilson, alias James Kennedy,vwas charged before Mr J. H. Luxford, S.M., with negligently driving a motor truck on the Hutt’Road on March 2, thereby causing the deaths of Mavis Eleanor Sixsmith and Audrey Joyce Wright. He was further charged with the conversion of a truck.

The evidence yesterday included that of John Patrick Wltiteford, a civil servant, who, at about 2.30 on that morning, came upon the truck at rieht angles to the road a mile south of Petone crossing lights that were burning. He found a man sixteen feet away, one girl 27 feet away, and the other at least 50 feet away, all on the south side of the truck. Accused staggered across the road from the direction of the quarry. Only one of the four was conscious. There was no sign of liquor on him. The proceedings collapsed to-day bn the negligence charge, Mr Luxford dismissing it on the ground that there was no evidence of recklessness or ex-

cessive speed. James Alexander Shaw, a vehicle inspector, in evidence, stated that in examining the undercarriage of the truck he- discovered that the . right front shock absorber was disconnected He considered that certain damage had been caused by the truck being' driven at over 40 miles an hour going round a bend, and that, owing to resistance on the shock absorber, the vehicle lurched heavily to the left side, demaging • the front brake arm, and thus applying the left front brake. He considered that was the cause of the vehicle getting out of control. When lie appeared in Court thF afternoon, Wilson pleaded guilty to the unlawful conversion of the truck, and was remanded, until Monday for sentence.