GUILTY OF NEGLIGENCE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20501, 31 August 1928, Page 10

GUILTY OF NEGLIGENCE.

LORRY DRIVER CONVICTED,

STATE OF INTOXICATION DEFINED.

(Per United Press Association

HAMILTON, August 30. A case arising out of a fatal accident at Te Aroha was concluded in the Supreme Court to-day when John Walker, the driver of a lorry which capsized on July 14, causing the death of a woman named Hiria Turawaho, was found guilty of negligent driving and not guilty of drunkenness while in charge of a motor car. He will be sentenced to-mOrrow. Mr Justice Blair, summing up, said there was a legal difference between being in a state of intoxication and being drunk. A man might be in a state of intoxication while walking along the road and yet not be liable to be locked up for drunkenness. He might, however, legally be regarded as in a state of intoxication when he happened to be in charge of a motor vehicle if he had imbibed sufficient liquor to render him incapable of properly performing the functions of a motor driver. There was evi '.ence that the prisoner had imbibed seven or eight small whiski and there was evidence that after the accident the prisoner did little to assist lifting the lorry off the unfortunate woman who had broken her neck. On the other hand, they had medical evidence that he was able successfully to go through the tests for sobriety two hours after the accident. The vehicle, the evidence showed, was ill-equipped. In law, there was no difference between a man driving a well-equipped vehicle badly and driving a badly-eqmpped vehicle with care. A driver was negligent who knowingly took on a public road a vehicle in a defective state. The prisoner in this case knew that the brakes were defective.