PROBATION FOR DRIVER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1002, 19 June 1930, Page 12

PROBATION FOR DRIVER

CRASHED INTO POWER POLE DARKENED WHOLE TOWN Special to THE SUN NEW PLYMOUTH, Today. I A large part of the town and counI try districts was plunged into com- ; plete darkness on the evening of May • 26 as tho result of an electric light pole being .rammed by a car driven ; by George Lewis Coles, an American j citizen, an oil-driller from Mexico, emi ployed on the oil well at Omata. In the Police Court yesterday Coles ; pleaded guilty to a charge of being ; intoxicated while in charge of a car. ! Counsel pleaded in extenuation that j defendant had taken a nip of whisky ! to ward off the effects of working out* | doors on an excessively cold day. De--1 fendant was unused to intoxicants, and | was easily affected thereby. It was ; not an ordinary case of intoxication, i and defendant’s memory was perfectly i clear as to the happenings. : The road at that particular i^int • was very badly defined, and the post j abutted dangerously on to it, so that any man might easily be excused for !an error of judgment. Defendant had j suffered a broken collarbone and other I injuries, necessitating hospital treat- | ment. His car had been damaged to | the extent of £l3O. and he had paid .for the damage, £l3 Bs, to the electrij city department. . The magistrate stressed the danger ’ and loss to the community, and ad- ; mitted Coles to 12 months’ probation, ' ordered him to take out a prohibition j order, and disqualified him from holdjAns a driver’s licence for that period*