To cause a serious accident on the N34 near Klijndijk, a 32-year-old woman from Emmen was demanded 120 hours and a six-year driving ban. A couple from Coevorden were seriously injured in the accident on 14 June 2023.
The woman from Coevorden was 21 weeks pregnant, the unborn child died due to the accident.
According to the Emmense, the picking up of a can of cola was the cause that she did not pay attention to the road for two seconds. Because of this she saw too late that the traffic stood still for her and bumped into a rear car.
This car ended up on the other half of the road and was scooped by the car of the couple from Coevorden. A fourth car collided with the couple’s car again. The pair from Coevorden was taken to the hospital with several bone fractures. Both have not been recovered to this day.
The Emmense was en route to the recreational lake ‘t Nije Hemelriek in Gasselte. She drank from a can that she accidentally dropped. She picked it up from the ground, came up and suddenly saw a row of cars looming on the straight road before her. She braked with all power, but it was already too late. She did not have a lawyer and did not appear at the hearing.
“Too bad, I had questions for her,” the judge said. The police investigation shows that the woman was busy with her phone, shortly before the accident.
The Emmense certainly denied this. The phone information shows that on her phone up to six minutes before the collision, we searched for renting a car on Mallorca. In addition, active data was typed. “I think I accidentally touched that app when I turned on the Spotify Music app,” the woman said.
The public prosecutor cannot conclude that she was on her phone during the accident “but shortly before,” he said. Anyway, the woman has been distracted for a while. In their own words ‘only’ two seconds. According to the calculations, that must have been longer, the prosecutor said.
He thinks the woman was pretty careless during her ride. With major consequences, he said. The same evening of the accident, the expectant mother no longer felt life with her child. It had died as a result of the accident.
It could not have been living independently at this stage and then this is legally seen as serious physical injury. “I can understand that this feels different for the mother,” said the public prosecutor.
The suspect shows himself to be guilty, said the public prosecutor. “However, how it went exactly is not entirely clear.” No damage claim has been submitted. The damage is settled through the insurance.
The court will rule on 28 February.