DEATHS BY SHOOTING

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22117, 24 May 1935, Page 10

DEATHS BY SHOOTING

DANGER FROM FIREARMS TWO HASTINGS INQUESTS [BT TELEGKAPH —PBESS ASSOCIATION"] HASTINGS, Thursday "It is a remarkable thing that on the same day we should have tvro inquiries' into the deaths of three comparatively young men, attributable in each case to firearms," said the Hastings district coroner, Sir. G. Ebbett, to-day. "It shows the grave danger otf leaving loaded firearms about. I know the witness responsible in one case has told us he had previously inspected the rifle and did not know there was a cartridge left in it. "However, I think that in a genera!, way a man leaving loaded firearms, lying about should be subject to some sort of punishment," the coroner concluded. V The first inquest concerned the deaths of Mr. Harold Smith, a Hastings land agent, and his 17-year-old son,. Douglas, who were fatally shot on a lake at Ohiti on May 6 when duck shooting. The coroner returned a verdict; that the deceased met their deaths by pure accident, there being no direct evidence to show how the fatality occurred. One witness said that Douglas Smith had told him before he died that he was pulling a gun out of the boat by the muzzle when it discharged. The other inquest concerned the death of Mr. Cedric Woodfield, a young man, on May 3. A group of young men were assembled in a bedroom when a rifle was discharged. One witness said lie opened the bolt of the rifle and then shut it, thus cocking it. He was sure it bad been unloaded previously, so he did not look in the breach. Apparently when he unloaded the rifle the magazine spring had failed to function, so as to bring the. lfemaining cartridge into "view. The coroner returned a verdict that deceased met his death as the result of laceration of the brain, caused by the discharge of a rifle.