MOTOR FATALITIES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22326, 28 July 1934, Page 16

MOTOR FATALITIES

■ SAFETY OF PUBLIC ' JURIES ARE THE GUARDIANS.' These charges of negligence ‘ cans- " ihg death iare matters of'great irii- , portance, because they involve ; the ' safety .of the public and the use of , the King’s highway, and you, gentle--' men of-the jury, are tne guardians. When I say you I mean not only you,, but the juries; who,’have to fry cases of this kind—you are the dians of the road. .' With these words, and with a ! rcciifal of . the revelant section . of. the statute, the 1 Chief Justice (Sir Michael Myers) prefaced his summing up to a jury in the Supreme Court at Wellington on the trial of a young man charged 'with negligent driving thereby causing death. Continuing, his Honor,said there wag no magic in the meaning of the word “negligence.” It, meant no more: than a want of reasonable care. It was the duty of every; person who drove t ractor vehicle, which was a source of potential danger to the public, to eseroise reasonable care, so that the public should hot bo injured nor any; member of • it.* -II there was an absence of that reasonable care, and if by reason of that Absence of reasonable . care a person wat killed or injured, the driver of the motor vehicle who had been negligent and,who's*, negligence had. brought about death or bodily injury had committed ah offence under the statute. .. .

It was quite correct that, the Crown must prove its case to the satisfaction of the jury beyond reasonable doubt-be-fore the jury was entitled to convict. What, therefore, the jury in this case had to consider, was, first, whether the accused drove a motor cycle on the day in question and in the. particular locality in question negligently—that was to say, whether he was guilty of want of care or breach of duty to take care, and, if • so. whether that breach of duty, that negligence, brought about the death ,of a man who had been killed. If satisfied on these two points/ then it would he the jury’s duty to convict the accused. If the Grown had left ' them in some reasonable doubt on those two points., , then it, was the jury’s duty to acquits the accused. His Honor then went on to refer, to the acts of negligence of which the. Crows suggested the accused was guilty, his remarks in this connection appearing in the report of the trial. , '