ACCIDENT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 August 1941, Page 7

ACCIDENT

FAILURE TO STOP CHARGE THE THORBY CASEFINE AND PROBATION. On a charge of failing to stop a motor-lorry after an accident on July 13 at Masterton, to which he pleaded guilty at Masterton on August 5, Reginald Guy Thorby, labourer, aged 23, was fined £l5, admitted to probation for 12 'months, and prohibited from holding a licence for two years when he appeared for sentence before Mr Justice Johnston in the Supreme Court. Wellington, yesterday. Mr C. J. O'Regan appeared for prisoner.

Accused had an unblemished record and came from a long-established Wairarapa family, said Mi' O’Regan. He should have stopped, but the circumstances were not of his creation. A girl ran out suddenly and the accident ,was inevitable. There was no question of any civil proceedings being brought. Counsel said it was a case of an immature and inexperienced young man being faced by the need for making a major decision and taking a wrong course. There were two men in the truck with him and they should have known better. Mr Justice Johnston said it was fortunate that no very serious results followed the accident. Though the result in a sense did not add to the criminality of the act, the result must in many cases affect the sentence. He thought that justice would be satisfied, considering the prisoner's youth and good character, if he were not sent to prison.