MOTORIST CONFESSES.

Shannon News, 25 November 1921, Page 1

MOTORIST CONFESSES.

RAN OVER A BOY AND LEFT HIM DEAD ON ROAD. Tiie mystery attaching to the identity of the driver of the car responsible I for the death of the six-year-old lad, Frederick Arthur Robert Allen, who was killed at the Karainu Bridge, near Hastings, on November 2, was lifted on Friday at Napier, when the inquest was resumed before Mr R. "W. Dyer, S.M. Sergeant McLean detailed the steps taken to trace the driver of the car and put in the following statement, made by Morgan Davies:— “I am a farmer, living at No. S 5 Milton Road, Napier. My farm is at Patoka. On Wednesday, November 2, I left Napier in a car a little after 3 p.m. for Hastings, .via Clive and Mangateretere. I had had a considerable amount of liquor, at least five whiskys and rfodas, before I left. I now wish to make a voluntary statement of what I remember took place during my drive on that afternoon-. “1 had not, from the first, any intention of disguising anything. 1 ,did not, from the first, consider the mishap anything but an accident. I don’t know why I did not see the child until the car almost. struck it. Possibly I was keeping on my proper side of the road, as one does on hill roads in the country, and struck the child. No doubt I did the wrong thing, as the shock of seeing the Child'down horrified me, and probably I did not put on the brakes un-_ til the child was run over. After, going a bit further I looked back and saw the child on the road, and then I remember no more until, in & hazy way, I remember pulling up at Badley’s, store at Greenmeadows and going in. “What I did there I don’t remember. Going along the road to Edward’s place the first I remember was that he called out to me. I can’t say if I remembered then about die child. Perhaps I did in a hazy way. After speaking to Mr Edwards I tried to re-start my car, but could not do so. I then left it on the. side of the road well out of the way of traffic, and I drove home in Edwards’ car. “FELT IT WAS TOO LATE.” “I saw an account of the accident in the papers the next morning, but did not realise it. Why I did not communicate with the police I do not know. I probably felt it was too late and did not realise the position I had placed myself in. “On the morning of November 3 I went back with Edwards and Miller to where I had left the car and found j nothing disturbed. I then noticed lor the first time that the glass of the left head lamp was broken. A man came out from Napier and repaired my car (carburetter trouble). I then went on to my farm at Patoka with Miller. ANOTHER SLEEPLESS NIGHT. “I then really began for the first time to realise things and returned to Napier on the Friday afternoon (November 4) and called at my solicitor’s office (Grant’s). Grant was at Waipukurau and would not be back until the next morning. After another sleepless night I could not face it and the police came then. If I had pulled up my car as soon as I struck the boy everybody would have realised it was an accident. Whether was from shock or what else I do not know what made me keep going on. “When I returned from Patoka i washed down by car with a hose. 1 did not do this with a view of hiding anything concerning the accident.” This concluded the evidence, as the inspector said he did not propose t) call Morgan Davies. THE CORONER’S VERDICT. The coroner said the evidence was clear that the boy died through injuries received by his being run over by a motor-car driven by Morgan Davies, and returned a verdict accordingly. Iu the Magistrate’s Court Davies was then charged with manslaughter and remanded on batl until Monday.