PENALTY OF £20

Manawatu Standard, Volume LV, Issue 87, 11 March 1935, Page 8

PENALTY OF £2O

CHARGE AGAINST MOTORIST Stating that defendant was suffering from sciatica, and unable to be present, his counsel (Mr A. M. Ongley) entered a plea of guilty in the Magistrate’s Court to-day, before Mr J. L. Stout, S.M., when Walter Anderson, aged, 55, a farmer, of Rangitanc, was charged that, on March 2 at Rangitane, while in a state of intoxication, he was in charge of a motor vehicle on the Palmerston North-Foxton Road.

Sergeant Culloty stated that at 6 p.m. on Saturday, March 2, defendant was driving some ten chains from the Itangitane bend. He overtook a lorry containing five passengers, including two women sitting on fruit cases in the back of the vehicle. Defendant went right off the road on to the grass, pursued an erratic course, went over to the right-hand side, and then turned sharply to the left, colliding with the lorry. Mrs Hotmail, who had a baby with her. was thrown out of the hack of the lorry and iujured, The vehicle was pushed 60 yards along the road by defendant’s car. The worst feature of the accident was that when defendant’s car stopped he got out and went home. At 8 p.m. when the polie arrived, he was trying to move Jiis car, and they found him in a muddled state through drink. He had previously been convicted of being drunk in charge of a car. For defendant, Mr Ongley said the former was about to pass the lorry when a car appeared from the opposite direction. He pulled in behind the lorry, but struck it, the wheels jambing. His car did not push it 60 yards, the vehicles travelling that distance tinder their own power. He delivered some parcels subsequently to a property close by, went home to attend to his cows, and returned. Commenting that it was defendant’s second offence, the Magistrate ficrnl him £2O, with 18s costs, ordered the cancellation of his license, and directed that no fresh one should be issued for a period of two years. Defendant was ordered to pay a deposit of £5 on the fine, and the balance at the rate of £5 a month.

“It is bad. enough to have sober motorists coming round corners on the wrong side of the road, without them being drunk,” added the Magistrate. “I met a few myself yesterday.”