DENTIST CHARGED

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 383, 18 June 1928, Page 1

DENTIST CHARGED

INTOXICATION IN CAR ALLEGED MANGERE BRIDGE SMASH Charges against W. Faulder, an Auckland dentist, of negligent driving, drunkenness while in charge of a motor-car, and failing to report an accident, are being heard a * the Onehunga Police Court today. The evidence disclosed that on Saturday, February 20, at 1.30 p.m., Faulder took a bricklayer named Barber to Otuhuhu, and on returning via Mange™ tiie car struck an electric light pole on Mangere bridge. The front wheel was smashed and Barber went to hospital for three weeks. Barber, in court, said they spent 20 minutes at the Captain Cook Hotel and called at Prince Albert Hotel for threequarters of an hour. They next stopped at the Criterion Hotel. Otahuhu. They left Otahuhu at 8 p.m. for home. All the way defendant was inviting pedestrians to have a ride, but none did so. He acted strangely, and was in liquor. On Mangere bridge witness felt a bump, and knew no more till he recovered consciousness in hospital. FAULDER’S DENIAL Faulder, in a statement to the police, denied that he was in the car when it struck the pole. He said that before reaching the bridge he left the car for a few minutes, and when he returned the car was gone, and so was Barber. He thought someone had stolen the car during his absence, and being offered a lift by another driver he was driven to his home. Constable Johnsen, of Onehunga, said that at 9.10 p.m. on February 20 he saw the car on the footpath of the bridge. Barber was on the front seat in a dazed condition, and there was no sign of the driver. One witness deposed that shortly after the accident he say Faulder and pulled him from between the handrail and the car. Faulder said to Barber, “It's all right. Come on, Barber.” Witness said the driver was muddled and not fit to drive. He went for assistance and returned. The driver then had disappeared and the injured man was still in the car. (Proceeding.)