It is a terrible road accident which occurred on August 26, 2020. And when the president of the correctional court of Nîmes, Jean-Pierre Bandiera, summarizes this deadly shock, the mother of the victim, in tears, is forced to leave the courtroom.
“The shock disintegrated the victim. There were pieces on the pavement“, explains President Jean-Pierre Bandiera.
It is 4:25 pm when a professional Kangoo vehicle tries to overtake another car. We are on the Chemin des Canaux in Nîmes, just after the Bastide roundabout, in the Vauvert-Nîmes direction. The 22-year-old driver claims not to have seen the scooter. He overtook, he was not in his lane and the accident was immediate. The 28-year-old victim died before help arrived.
” How did you manage not to see this scooter driver “, asks the magistrate. “I do not know. I looked three times, I did not see it “, underlines the defendant whose analyzes revealed that he had not drunk and that he was not under the influence of narcotics. A driver who has never had a problem with the law so far. The three testimonies of other drivers present on the road that day are contradictory and do not allow us to get a precise idea of the circumstances of the tragedy. “We do not know precisely the point of impact. The investigators have not managed to define it, it poses a real problem “, argues the defense lawyer.
The victim’s mother approaches the bar: ” My son was leaving his home to get keys for a construction site.“A moving mother, of great dignity, who forgives the one who killed her only son.”I am going to see my son in the cemetery, but he must live. I forgave him“, declares between two sobs this woman broken by the disappearance of her only son. The victim, Maxime, 28 years old was going to be father two months later, he will never know his child.
” Me, my client who was Maxime’s partner, did not have the strength and courage to come today. She was 7 months pregnant when the accident killed her companion. She is not ready today to forgive“, adds a lawyer for the civil parties.
Difficult to know the precise circumstances of this accident and how this defendant could not have seen the pilot of the scooter while the weather conditions were perfect. A young driver whose license has never been suspended so far.
“A file or misfortune is on all sides. We find ourselves in a situation where it is not a question of an offender. This boy was driving at 80km / h, that is to say at the authorized speed“, estimates the defense lawyer. The court sentenced the defendant to 12 months in prison, 6 of which were suspended and the suspension of his driving license for 6 months.
Boris de la cruz
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