NURSE ACQUITTED

Hokitika Guardian, 9 July 1932, Page 5

NURSE ACQUITTED

NEGLIGENT DRIVING CHARGE. (Per Press Association — Copyright.) WELLINGTON, July 8. ... Expressing the opinion that no jury would convict on the evidence brought forward by the prosecution, Mr Page, S.M., in the Police Court to-day, dismissed the charge against Given Adelaide Dryden, a nurse at the Public Hospital, of negligently driving a motor-car so as to cause the death of Mrs Euphemia Donaldson Stanton. When the ease was resumed, further evidence for the defence was Heard. Burn Stanley Bland, driver of the W< llington Hospital waggon, said he‘ was in Adelaide Road on May 4th near the Brown Street tram stop. He had hacf to pull up .when Mrs Stanton stepped off the footpath. She stepped back, and he moved off again. He. had not gone far when.' lie hoard a scream, and, looking round, lie saw Miss Dryden’s ear on the footpath. He 1 went back, and lie found that Mrs Stanton had been killed. .

The Magistrate said that the evidence showed that, while the accused was driving her car in Adelaide Road, just beyond the tram stop, and just after having passed a tram, she knocked clown the woman. There was some conflict in the evidence as to whether the stop of the tram was a normal stop or a late stop. “T think the inference is that in her anxiety to catch tile tram the wiinan may not have been fully' observant of the of'er traffic,’’ said the Magistrate. “The accused was driving on the proper side of the m ,d and I don’t think the evidence has established that she was driving at an undue speed. To justify committal, there i: ust be reasonable evidence of ’criminal negligence on the part of the accused. ’>

SUBMARINE DISASTER. CHERBOURG, July 8. The Proniothee has been located at a depth of 230 feet by means olj a buoy which was automatically released when the submarine sank. It carried a telephone 'to. th e interior of the hud!, but there was no response to the calls. The position renders salvage very difficult.' A isister ship of the Artiglio, the Rostro, is rushing to assist.