Wrong-side road victim ‘will never get over it’
Emotional scenes in court as victim-impact reports read out. Annette Lambly-Robinson reports.
An American tourist who killed a mum-to-be and another woman in a head-on crash has avoided jail time.
Thomas James Springer was disqualified from driving for 18 months when he appeared for sentencing in the Kaikohe District Court yesterday. He will also pay reparation of $24,200 to the victims’ families.
The 66-year-old caused the head-on smash by driving on the wrong side of the road on State Highway 10 near Kerikeri on April 30.
The crash claimed the lives of Kylee Anne Rakich, 29, who was eight months’ pregnant, and Virginia Keogh, 44.
Springer pleaded guilty to two charges of careless driving causing death as well as careless driving causing injury to Rakich’s husband, 21-year-old Cameron Dwight, who was driving.
Dwight read out a victim impact statement, saying: ‘‘I play it over and over again, and I don’t think I will ever get over it.’’
There were emotional scenes in court as other family members read out their own victim impact statements.
Keogh’s daughter, Renee, told the court: ‘‘My mum will not be able to celebrate any milestones or get to know her grandchildren. You took away my mother, my best friend and my world.
‘‘You have left us wondering what could have been. I am lost and in pain.’’
Rakich’s five-year-old daughter was present in the courtroom with her mother’s half-sister, Leash King.
‘‘She keeps telling me, ‘I miss my mum’. No child should grow up without a mum,’’ said King.
The court heard that a restorative justice meeting had been held this week between Springer and family members of both victims.
King said she told Springer at that meeting: ‘‘You need to forgive yourself and you need to get on with your life.’’
Springer, who has a tumour, will travel back brain to the United States for treatment.
After the tragedy King called for foreign drivers to be required to sit a two-week driving course.
Her petition gathered signatures.
The day before the sentencing, Leash said she hoped Springer would be held to justice but said: ‘‘I expect that he’ll get a fine and he gets to go home. He probably won’t get the three months but it is what it is.
‘‘I don’t think it’s fair, for people to die, it’s not right.
‘‘But it was an accident, he didn’t intentionally do it so they’ll probably give him a lower sentence.’’
Dwight, the driver of the car, backed King’s petition, in the hope that other people would not experience the pain the victims’ families experienced. three