Widow says ‘ wrong person jailed’ over death crash on smart M- way

THE WIDOW of man who was killed when a lorry ploughed into his stranded car on a smart motorway has said the wrong person has been jailed, after the truck driver was given a 10- month long sentence.

Jason Mercer, 44, and Alexandru Murgeanu, 22, died when a lorry driven by Prezemyslaw Szuba, 40, crashed into their vehicles, which had stopped on a stretch of the M1 without a hard shoulder after a “minor shunt”.

Szuba was jailed yesterday at Sheffield Crown Court by a judge who compared motorway hard shoulders with lifeboats on ships, but added that Szuba had to take the major part of the blame.

Imposing the prison term for causing the deaths by careless driving, Judge Jeremy Richardson QC said: “Had there been a hard shoulder, or had the victims driven on for another mile to the refuge, this catastrophe would never have occurred.”

But he added: “There must be no doubt, however, that the main cause of this fatal crash was your inattention to the road ahead of you.”

Speaking outside court, Claire Mercer, who has led a prominent campaign against smart motorways, said: “We don’t believe the correct person is taking responsible for this massive detrimental effect on ours and so many other people’s lives.

“The events of June 7, 2019, would not have taken place if there had been a hard shoulder and Highways England was run with the correct priorities in mind – not concentrating on who wins the next big contract.”

Referring to a national review of smart motorways, she said: “An agenda genuinely concerned with avoiding future deaths is not served by a pretend review and 18 compromises that wouldn’t have saved any of 40- plus people killed by smart motorways, or by jailing the wrong person.”

The judge was told how Szuba was driving well within the speed limit, had not been drinking or on drugs and was not distracted by any devices when he crashed into the vehicles just north of junction 34, near Sheffield’s Meadowhall shopping centre.

Judge Richardson QC said it was not his role to conduct a public inquiry into the road system, but he added: “A hard shoulder strikes me as analogous to the emergency doors on an aeroplane or lifeboats on ships.”