On Monday, the Riga District Court acquitted a driver in a criminal case of driving over members of the family of Riga Mayor Mārtiņš Staķis (PP).
The court administration informed that an abbreviated criminal sentence had been handed down in court in a lawsuit against Leonid Baron in a road accident in which two people were killed and two were seriously injured. The baron has been charged under section 260 of the Criminal Code for violating traffic rules.
According to the case-law, in order for criminal liability to arise under that article of the Criminal Code, it must be established that there is a causal link between the traffic offense and its consequences and the driver’s fault in the traffic offense and its consequences.
On the other hand, it follows from the Road Traffic Regulations that the legislator has made the protection of the rights of pedestrians and cyclists a priority over the rights of drivers.
The court, assessing the evidence gathered in the criminal case as a whole and in its mutual connection, in accordance with the Criminal Procedure Law, established the basis for making an acquittal, explained the judge of the Riga District Court Ingrīda Bite.
The said law stipulates that the court shall make an acquittal if the offense does not constitute a criminal offense.
“In the actions of the accused Leonid Baron, there is no criminal offense provided for in Section 260, Paragraph three of the Criminal Law, ie there is no objective party, because the accused has not violated traffic rules, therefore there is no causal link with the consequences,” Bite pointed out.
The tragic traffic accident took place on the evening of December 2018. Four people, in the dark of the day, without reflective elements on their clothes, on Meža prospekts in Jūrmala, crossed a high-traffic carriageway in an unpredictable place, although there was an adjustable pedestrian crossing nearby.
The prosecutor’s office previously wrote in a press release that, according to the accusation, the accused was driving his own car and, violating the traffic rules, hit four pedestrians at the “Dzintari Concert Hall” stop.
Two of the injured men died, while two more suffered serious and moderate injuries, respectively.
The victims were Staak’s father and grandfather.
The prosecutor’s office will have the opportunity to object to the first-instance judgment.
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