HIT-AND-RUN DRIVERS

Taranaki Daily News, 13 February 1935, Page 4

HIT-AND-RUN DRIVERS

tightening of law suggested. CHIEF JUSTICE’S COMMENTS. By Telegraph—Press Association. Wellington, Last Night. A hint that the law relating to the prosecution of hit-and-run motorists might well oe tightened up so that the onus of proof rested upon a motorist who did not stop or report to the police to establish that he was not aware. of accident was given by the Chief Justice, Sir Michael Myers, in the Supreme Court to-day in his summing-up during the trial - f a motorist charged with negligent driving causing death. “It might be a wise thing if pie legislature carried the relevant section of the Motor Vehicles Act a little further to provide that where an accident happens and the driver of a motor vehicle does not stop or does not report to the police that there should be thrown upon him the onus of proving in any criminal or civil proceedings that might follow that the accident happened without his knowledge,” said the Chief Justice. “I am expressing no definite opinion whether that would be wise or not. I merely make the suggestion as being worthy of consideration by those whose duty it is to shape this branch of the law.”