Child Was Standing On Driver's Lap, Court Told
The Age
Tuesday February 12, 2008
A FATHER on trial over the road deaths of six teenagers was driving on the night of the crash with a child standing on his lap, a Supreme Court jury has been told.
Witness Nikki Rayson said the child - apparently aged between one and three - was leaning over the back of the driver's seat. The child appeared to be talking to another child in the back of the blue station wagon.Ms Rayson said she was watering her garden on the night of February 18, 2006, when she saw the vehicle leaving nearby Nicholls Court at Red Cliffs, near Mildura.She said Thomas Graham Towle, now 36, had his left arm around the waist of the standing child, and pulled him back down onto his lap. He appeared to be cutting corners when he drove from her street, she said, and travelling too quickly for the area in which he was driving."Because there's always children out the front of everybody's houses, there's always a lot of traffic in that area, and yes, he was going a bit fast," she said.Ms Rayson said the car was on the wrong side of the road when turning one corner, and would have had a collision had another vehicle been travelling in the opposite direction.She was giving evidence in the Supreme Court before Justice Philip Cummins.Towle, formerly of Red Cliffs, has pleaded not guilty to 14 charges arising from the crash on the night of February 18.He has been charged with six counts of culpable driving, four of negligently causing serious injury, two of reckless conduct endangering serious injury and one each of failing to stop after an accident and failing to render assistance.Killed were Shane Hirst, 16, and his sister, Abby, 17, Stevie-Lee Weight, 15, and Cassandra Manners, Cory Dowling and Josephine Calvi, all 16.During cross-examination by senior defence counsel Robert Richter, QC, Ms Rayson agreed no children were at the relevant street corners.Ms Raynor said she usually drove at the 100 km/h speed limit on Myall Road, which led from Red Cliffs to the town of Cardross. She also agreed she had never encountered children at the intersection of Myall Road and Boobook Avenue, where the collision occurred.
© 2008 The Age