"ARE YOU INSURED"

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19041, 15 June 1936, Page 5

"ARE YOU INSURED"

QUESTION BY JURYMAN

CLAIM AGAINST MOTORIST

SYDNEY, June 5.

"Are you insured?" a juryman in an action m the Supreme Court yesterday suddenly asked of the defendant in what the legal profession knows as a "running down case." * . : . The defendant, Walter .G. Dann, was being sued for damages by Frederick George Arnold, who had a leg broken on the Prince's highway on April 21, 1935, when the motor-cycle-which be was riding was' in collision with Dann's motor car.

Dann was in the witness box denying that the accident resulted from his negligence, and had before him a map of the scene of the collision. He was examining the map with the two counsel. Before anybody could stop him he answered "Yes" to the juryman's question. Nothing was said of the incident at that stage, but after the luncheon adjournment, Mr. L. J. Herron, for Dann, asked Mr. Acting-Justice- Owen to discharge the jury. He submitted to His Honour that the question showed that in the mind of the juryman insurance was an important matter. His Honour: It was unfortunate that everyone was clustered round the witness box, and the question was asked before I knew what it was. I do not know what the answer-was..':' Mr. Herron: The answer may." influence the jury's verdict now they 's-now that the defendant has not to bear any personal responsibility <_. - His Honour: I know that I have a discretion to proceed with the trial or discharge the jury, but I am inclined to follow the moderate practice operating, which is to impress' on the jury that the question whether the. defendant is insured or not has absolutely nothincr to do with the issues for trial. Mr. Herron said that in all the cases on the point thai element of insurance had been introduced by one of the parties, but that here it was brought out by a member of the. jury.. The* trial was resumed, and in his summing up His Honour impressed upon the jury that they had to try only the issuesi of negligence and damage's, and that they must disregard the question of insurance. The iury returned a verdict for the defendant.