Driver denies blame for picket death

CHRISTCHURCH - A man accused of killing a woman on a picket line at Lyttelton "jumped" his car three times before hitting two people, the Christchurch District Court was told yesterday.

Derek Paul Powell, aged 52, boatbuilder, has elected trial by jury on a charge of causing the death of Christine Clarke, 45, by dangerous driving.

Police prosecutor Sergeant Wayne Jones told a depositions hearing that last December 29 about noon Powell stopped briefly at a picket line of up to 100 port workers.

After an altercation, he "jumped" his car three times, then "put his foot down" and drove through the picket line. All but two of the pickets managed to get out of the way.

However, Ms Clarke rode up on the bonnet of the vehicle and fell on to the road, banging her head. She was also run over by two wheels of Powell's car.

She died two days later of head injuries.

The dead woman's husband, Glen Cameron, gave evidence that she had undergone brain surgery after a stroke in 1997.

While noticeably slower immediately after returning home, she had made an incredible recovery with physiotherapy, Mr Cameron said.

She passed her driver's licence test in 1999 and was physically 100 per cent before her death in December, but still had very slight memory problems.

Mr Cameron said he was unaware that his wife intended to go on the picket line until she called him early on the morning of the industrial action.

"I just said, 'Be careful down there,' and that was the last time we spoke."

After a telephone call telling him his wife had been hit by a car, he drove to the picket line but was stopped and asked to wait about 200m from where he could see an ambulance.

He accompanied Ms Clarke to hospital in the ambulance. She was unconscious, but he thought she had a broken leg.

A neurosurgeon suggested an operation to relieve pressure on her brain, but she died at 5.20 pm on December 31.

Questioned, Mr Cameron agreed that he had no medical qualifications and his comment that Ms Clarke had made a 100 per cent recovery from her stroke was his own personal observation.

When she spent time at home recovering, her reactions after the stroke were the same as before.

Mr Cameron said that as he went to drive to the picket line, he saw a man being "thumped" by a group of others in a Cashin Quay cargo yard. The man had been punched while he was walking away from a car.

He saw someone pick up a piece of timber and the men walked around the vehicle smashing the headlights and tail-lights.

Mr Cameron said he did not recognise any of the men. He was between 200m and 300m away - too far to make out their features.

Re-examined by Sergeant Jones, Mr Cameron said the assault and car-smashing happened before he arrived at the picket line accident scene. His wife was still on the ground when he arrived.

Police plan to call 18 witnesses at the two-day depositions hearing before justices of the peace Carolyne Kellaway and Dennis Rich.

- NZPA