MOTORIST FINED.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 955, 27 December 1933, Page 8

MOTORIST FINED.

Negligent Driving irj City Street. BRANDY AFTER COLLISION. Accepting evidence that the combined effects of three glasses of ale, an accident and a brandy had been responsible for the condition of defendant when the police examined him, Mr H. P. Lawry, S.M., fined Percy Kirby, a company manager, £4 and costs in the Police Court to-day. In view of the evidence, the charge of being intoxicated in charge of a motor-car in Tuam Street on December 23 was treated by the Magistrate in fixing the penalty as a case of negligent driving. Sub-Inspector Edwards said that at 6.10 p.m. defendant, when driving his car along Antigua Street, took too wide a turn to go east along Tuam Street. He collided with a car going west and then glanced off to strike a telegraph pole. When the police saw him he was somewhat fuddled and smelt of liquor. He stated that he had had three beers, and he described the accident accurately. The medical report was that he was not much under the influence of alcohol but sufficiently to make him a danger to the public while in charge of a car. The alcohol must have had gome effect on his driving. That was defendant’s first offence. Had Been Working Hard. Mr Russell, who appeared for defendant, said that Kirby had been driving a motor-car for some twenty years, and this was the first time that he had been before the Court. He had been working very hard to get orders for retread tyres through before Christmas, and after finishing work at 5.30 p.m. he had three medium beers. A doctor friend who was with him would say that he was in a fit state to drive a car. Defendant received a blow on the forehead from the collision, and that, combined with the effects of a brandy which a friend gave him afterwards, put him in the condition in which the police found him. Dr Edward K. Edie, of Green Island, gave evidence that a brandy after the collision would probably render defendant unfit to drive a car. Prior to the accident defendant was in a fit state to drive. The Magistrate said that defendant’s condition would be influenced by the shock of the accident, and by the subsequent brandy. The combined effect of those, as well as the ale, put him in a condition in which he would be unfit to drive a car. In the fixing of the penalty the case would be treated as a very bad one of negligent driving.