Car crash doctor spared sack after treating his victim
‘She is not blaming him’
A DOCTOR spared jail over a car crash that left his teenage passenger paralysed is to keep his job after it emerged he has helped her walk again.
Dr David Rawaf, 28, was driving Ekaterina Nuss home when he tried to accelerate away from another car.
But he lost control when his BMW hit in a dip in the road, took off and span into nearby trees.
The mangled wreckage of his car only came to a standstill after it was hurled into a lamppost at speed.
Rawaf escaped with minor injuries, but Miss Nuss – an art student – was left with severe spinal damage and was paralysed from the waist down. Seventeen months on from the incident in Wandsworth, south London, she has only just started taking steps with assistance and has ‘life-changing injuries’, a medical tribunal heard.
Rawaf was convicted of causing serious injury by dangerous driving last December, but escaped with a 16-month jail sentence, suspended for two years.
This week, he faced being struck off by a medical tribunal for misconduct over the incident. However, a disciplinary panel decided to take no action against him after hearing how he had been visiting Miss Nuss to check on her progress, and she did not want him to be punished.
Colleagues from the School of Public Health at Imperial College London also said he had liaised with spinal injury experts and studied techniques to help him support her recovery.
Last night, her sister Valeria confirmed that Miss Nuss had forgiven Rawaf. She said: ‘It’s very difficult for her.
‘She is not blaming him. It was an accident.
‘So she doesn’t hate him, but she’s up and down.
‘She will need a miracle to walk again. There is a 2 per cent chance.’
The Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) was told that Rawaf crashed on January 24 last year.
Paul Moulder chairman of the panel, said Rawaf was a ‘capable, caring and conscientious’ doctor.
He added: ‘There are exceptional circumstances which would justify taking no action in this case.’