TRAPPING SPEEDSTERS

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 129, 22 August 1927, Page 13

TRAPPING SPEEDSTERS

FINES AT PAPAKURA MAGISTRATE APPLIES SCALE (From Our Own Correspondent.) PAPAKURA, To-day. A trap for speeding motorists set by the traffic inspector for the OtahuhuManurewa district, Mr. Daniel Fletcher. at Manurewa between 4 and 5.30 o’clock on Sunday afternoon of July 31. resulted in six motorists being charged with dangerous driving at the monthly sitting of the Papakura Police Court this morning. Only one defendant, Alan J. Milliken, appeared to contest the charge. The inspector said Milliken’s time over a measured quarter of a mile on the concrete, Great South Road, past four intersections, was 25 second!, equivalent to 36 miles an hour. Evidence to this effect was also given by Robert Forbes, Manurewa Town Board foreman. Milliken asked if there was a man at each end of the quarter-mile, and the inspector said. “No.” Milliken: “Then I cannot see how you could definitely assess the speed.” The inspector explained that a fixed point of vision, coinciding with a fixed point on the road was taken as a mark and motorists were given one chain to the good. Mr. J. W. Poynton, S.M.: This method was used in England and argued before the House of Lords, which held it was fair and reasonable. Milliken was therefore convicted and fined £5 and costs 11s Bd. Other offenders were fined as follows, the magistrate explaining the scale to be £2 up to 32 miles an hour, £3 from 32 to 35 miles, and £5 over 35 miles:—B. Chambers, 38.4 miles; Robert George Lyon, 37 miles; Pereival P. Gillespie, 36 miles; and John Noakes, 36 miles; each £5. IV. E. Donnelly, 34.6 miles, £3. Each defendant was ordered to pay costs, 11s Bd.