SUPREME COURT

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIII, Issue 284, 28 October 1933, Page 12

SUPREME COURT

CLAIM AND COUNTER-CLAIM. The hearing of evidence was concluded and the address of counsel for the defendant delivered, before the Supreme Court rose yesterday afternoon,, in the case in which Hodgkinson s Ltd., cartage contractors, Palmerston North, proceeded against Henry James Williams, of H.*J. Williams and Co., cartage contractor's, Feilding, claming £419 Is 5d special, and £IOO general damages, as the result of a collision between motor lorries owned by plaintiff and defendant at Te Horo on May 1, 1933. A counter-claim was entered for £316 16s Id special and £SO general damages. Messrs A. M. Ongley and W. L. Fitzherbert appeared for plaintiff and Mr W. H. Cunningham (Wellington) for defendant. . His Honour Mr Justice MacGregor was on the Bench. Following the midday adjournment yesterday. Phillip Fowler, member of a motor business in Palmerston North, detailed his experience of selling cars which had been concerned in a collision and depreciated in value. Harold Boyce Clapham, motor garage proprietor, in Palmerston North, said a car which had been in a collision depreciated. The depreciation to the lorry would be from £75 to £IOO following the collision. That concluded the evidence for the plaintiff. Outlining the case for the defendant, Mr Cunningham said that it brought forward an unusual point, that of dazzling lights. Although we had motor regulations he submitted that common law still applied and that no person should use the highway, or had arty right to go on the highway, whose lights were glaring and dazzling and were a danger. He understood that there had been only two cases based on that point before the Magistrate’s Court in New Zealand, and that another had come before Mr Page at Wellington that morning. His Honour said that it would require very strong evidence to prove to him that lights had had anything to do with the accident. Samuel Trevor Dibble, surveyor, gave evidence as to making plans of the scene of the accident. Howard Charles Gardiner, motor lorry driver, said he had been working for defendant for about two years. He was driving defendant’s lorry which was concerned in the accident. He had left Wellington just before 5 p.m. and his average speed would have been between 20 and 25 miles an hour. Thick, foggy rain was falling. When he saw plaintiff’s lorry coming he bore oC the crown of the road to the left and slackened speed slightly. He had the full glare of lights in his face. He felt a bump and the lorry, rolled over to the left into soft ground. He had the lights of the other lorry still in lus face and tried to get the lorry back on to the road. After going over a mound, with the front wheels on a hard right angle turn, the lorry went on to the road again. When the wheels first left the road the speed would have been between 17 and 18 miles and hour, and before the lorry got back on to the road again that speed had slackened. He would have been travelling between six and seven miles an hour when the lorry regained the road. The other lorry was going the faster when the two vehicles met. When witness got out of the cab he did not see Hodgkinson and there was no conversation as to whose liability the accident was. It was the bright headlights of the other vehicle only which caused his lorry to leave the road, and he |md previously found that the other was not an easy vehicle to pass at night. Witness had mentioned the otiier lorry’s lights to Mr Brown, who was the second driver in that lorry. Witness said he did not see Hodgkinson at the lorry at all at that time. To Mr Ongley, witness said his lorry’s front wheels did not reach the middle of the road when it pulled up and the back wheels were off tlie bitumen, When witness had telephoned Constable Hancock he had not said anything about the other lorry’s lights. Re-examined, witness said it was the dazzling lights soley of the other lorry which caused his vehicle to leave the road. Harry George Wiggins, a motor lorry driver, said Hougkinson’s lorry's headlights were very bright and on such a night as that of tlie accident they would have been very dazzling. John Alexander Porter, Wellington Automobile Club patrol officer, stationed at Levin, said he had found the lights of Hodgkinsoii’s lorry very dazzling, and it was a difficult vehicle to pass. The glare of its lights would be accentuated by wet bitumen. Cars and lorries carrying the same type of light had been reported on a number of occasions because of their lights. Patrick Donnelly, chief patrol officer of the Wellington Automobile Club, said he had tested Williams’s lorry’s lights and they had complied with the regulations. Lights such as were fitted to Hodgkinson’s lorry threw a broad beam that was hard to focus. A 35 candle-power bulb would make a •‘searchlight” of the lights. William Lowery, motor engineer of Wellington, who visited the scene of the accident next morning, said there was a 35 candle-power bulb in Hodgkinson’s lorry. That made a light causing most people to pull up when passing. The light was too big. Had the lorry stopped when it left the road it would have turned over. The best thing the driver could do in such a circumstance would have been to try to bring the lorry back on to the road. Had witness been in the other lorry he would have stopped. Henry James Williams, defendant, said that the day after the accident Gardiner had complained to him about the lights on plaintiff’s truck. He knew that truck as having difficult lights to pass. Witness had told plaintiff after the accident that “he was noted for having hard lights,” and plaintiff had said he had been meaning to change the bulbs. In reply to a question from His Honour, witness said that he had complained to Hodgkinson about his lights. His Honour referred to the evidence of Mr Gatley (secretary of Hodgkinson’s, Ltd.) and.to plaintiff’s evidence regarding the matter of lights. His Honour said that it was strange that there was no mention of lights in the letter from defendant to plaintiff. There seemed to be a conspiracy to assign the cause to the accident to the lights of plaintiff’s lorry. His Honour said later.that he could come' to only one decision, that he could believe Mr Gatley because he was consistent. Following the address of counsel for the defendant the Court adjourned until this morning.