MOTOR-CYCLIST TO PAY

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1048, 12 August 1930, Page 10

MOTOR-CYCLIST TO PAY

SEQUEL TO ACCIDENT JURY AWARDS £SOO DAMAGES Press Associatioyi % WELLINGTON, Monday. General damages and special damages, amounting in all to £1,112 4s Od, were claimed in the Supreme Court today by William MacGlashan Smith, a waterside worker, of Wellington, and his wife. Charlotte Smith, a bookseller, from Gilbert Jepson, a motor mechanic, as the sequel to an accident at Island Bay last November, in which Mrs. Smith was seriously injured.

The case was heard by Mr. Justice Ostler and a jury. Mrs. Smith and her dauglrter. aged 17, were injured when they were struck by a motor-cycle on a dark night. Mrs. Smith was severely hurt. Jepson was fined for negligent driving, and since then he had filed an admission of liability. % Mr. W. E. Leicester, for plaintiffs, said all the jury had to do was to decide reasonable damages. Since the accident, Smith had kept his wife’s shop going, and after paying all expenses he had been able to make only a small sum. Plaintiff’s home had been broken up since the accident. Smith was a waterside worker, and for some years prior to the accident had earned from £3 10s to £ 4 10s a week. Since the accident he had been able to work for only two days on the waterfront, and he was claiming at the rate of £2 10s a week from November 1. The daughter had to be bearded out # and a claim was being made in this respect also, Evidence was given by Dr. Gillies, orthopaedic specialist, at Wellington Hospital, and the plaintiffs. Mr. Treadwell, for defendant, invited the jury to come to the conclusion that the size of the claim was an outrage and an insult to their intelligence. Counsel submitted that it was a classic example of an extortionate claim. Acting on his advice, Jepson had paid £4OO into Court, and that, he contended, was a fair amount, and perhaps even a greater amount than that to . which the plaintiffs weer entitled. The jifry returned a verdict for £2OO general and for £3OO special damages.