MAGISTRATE’S COURT.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LI, Issue 207, 3 August 1931, Page 8

MAGISTRATE’S COURT.

BREACHES OF BY-LAWS. Mr J. L. Stout.. S.M., presided over the sitting of the Magistrate's Court to-day. For using a motor vehicle without Laving the assigned, number and distinguishing marks affixed thereto, A. J. Cranton and C. Puklowski were each fined 10s, with 10s costs. A similar penalty was imposed on J. ‘A. Scott for failure to possess a driver s license. , 1 H. Remnant was fined 10s, with Iks costs, for parking a car within six feet of a fire plug in Cuba Street. Charles F. Bowden was charged with failure to report to the police station an accident which occurred at the intersection of Ruahine and i eatherston Streets on July 18. He was further charged with not possessing a driver s license. Mr Oram appeared for defendant, who pleaded not guilty. SeniorSergeant Whitehouse said defendant had collided with and injured a boy on a bicycle, but did not report the accident until two davs later, when he was sought by the police. Mr Oram stated that defendant had pleaded not guilty jin order to secure the direction of the Court as to what extent a person had to be injured before a case had_ to be reported to the police. His IV or-hip said that if a person was knocked down at all, whether the motorist considered him to be hurt or not, he should report the case to the police in order to absolve himself from responsibility in the event of something unforeseen occurring. Defendant was fined life on each charge, with costs totalling £2 Is. F. D’Arcy, of Wanganui, entered fe plea of guilty through his solicitor, Mr Rodgers, to a charge of having been in charge of a car while intoxicated. Senior-Sergeant Whitehouse said that defendant, who was evidently in a poor state of health at the time of the offence, had spent the evening with friends at Palmerston North and had come under the influence of liquor, with the result that when he ,was driving his car down Victoria Avenue and went to turn into Te Awe Awe Street, he smashed into a gate. Later defendant proceeded over the Fitzherbert Bridge and, failing to take the turn there, ran his vehicle ■up the bank, from which it slipped back to come to rest against a water trough. Defendant was considerably injured, suffering severe cuts, and replained’ there from about 1.30 a.m. to 6 a.m., when he was given a lift into Mr Rodgers said that when the offence occurred defendant was tired and overworked, and on account of his general physical condition the drink which he took had had an unanticipated effect.—The Magistrate, in imposing a fine of £lO, with £1 os costs, and cancelling defendant’s license for three months, said he usually made the term of suspension at least six months, but had reduced it under the circumstances. It was’, he said, never his practice to deal with a motorist so convicted without imposing some period of cancellation of the driver’s license.