CLAIM FOR DAMAGES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21102, 12 August 1930, Page 10

CLAIM FOR DAMAGES.

SEQUEL TO MOTOR ACCIDENT. JURY AWARDS £SOO. (Special to Daily Times.) WELLINGTON, August 11. General damages and special damages amounting in all to, £lll2 4a 6d, were claimed in the Supreme Court to-day by William MacGlashan Smith, a waterside worker, of Wellington, and his wife, Charlotte Smith, bookseller, from Gilbert Jepson, motor mechanic, as the result of an accident at Island Bay last November, in which Mrs Smith was seriously injured. The case was heard by Mr Justice Ostler and a jury. Mrs Smith and her daughter, aged 17, were injured when struck by a motor cyclist on a dark night. Mrs Smith was severely hurt and Jepson was fined for negligent driving anji since had filed an admission of his liability. Mr Leicester, for the defendant, said that all the jury had to do was to decide reasonable damages. > Counsel said that since .the accident Smith had kept his wife’s shop going, and after all expenses he had only Ijeen able to make 13s 6d. The plaintiff's home had been broken up since the accident. Smith was a waterside worker by occupation and for some years prior to the accident he earned £3 10s to £4 10s a week. Since the accident he had been able to work only two days on the waterfront, and lie was claiming at the rate of £2 10s a week from November 1. The daughter had to be boarded out, and a claim was being made in this respect also. Evidence was given by Dr Gillies, orthopaedic' specialist at Wellington Hospital, and the plaintiffs. Mr Treadwell invited the jury to come to the conclusion that the size of the claim was an outrage and an insult to their intelligence. Counsel submitted it was a classic example of an extortionate claim. Acting on his advice Jepson had paid in £4OO, and that, he contended, was a fair and perhaps even a greater amount than that to which the plaintiffs were entitled. The jury, returned a verdict for £2OO general and £3OO special damages.