Wrong person is being jailed says smart motorway widow
A WIDOW whose husband was killed on a smart motorway says the wrong person is being punished after a lorry driver was jailed.
Claire Mercer said she did not believe the “correct person is taking responsibility” for the death of Jason and another motorist Alexandru Murgeanu in June last year.
The pair were killed when they were struck by an 18- ton HGV driven by Prezemyslaw Szuba after pulling over on a stretch of motorway with no hard shoulder.
Szuba, 40, was jailed for 10 months at Sheffield Crown Court yesterday after admitting two counts of causing death by driving without due care and attention on the M1.
He was not speeding, nor under the influence of drink or drugs.
Mrs Mercer, who has mounted a prominent campaign against smart motorways since Jason’s death, said: “We don’t believe the correct person is taking responsibility 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. My hope in this devastation is that no more lives are ruined needlessly.”
Mr Mercer, 44, and Mr Murgeanu, 22, had been involved in a minor collision with each other near Sheffield and pulled into the slow lane, where a hard shoulder would normally be, before getting out of their vehicles to exchange details.
They were standing between Mr Murgeanu’s Ford Transit and Mr Mercer’s Ford Focus for almost six minutes, during which time they were seen and avoided by many drivers. By contrast, Szuba failed to adjust his speed or position and continued in the same lane until the fatal collision at 56mph.
Sentencing, Judge Jeremy Richardson QC said it was not his role to conduct a public inquiry, but added: “A hard shoulder strikes me as analogous to the emergency doors on an aeroplane or lifeboats on ships.
“One never hopes ever to use them, and most of the time you never do. But they’re there. Had there been a hard shoulder, or had the victims driven on for another mile to the refuge, this catastrophe would never have occurred.”
An investigator concluded that while both men had breached the Highway Code by not moving to the emergency refuge section a mile away, the primary responsibility for the tragedy lay with Szuba’s failure to spot the stationary van.
Judge Richardson said: “The main cause was your inattention to the road ahead of you.”