1/3 Photo: Toby de Kort/SQ Vision.
The man who killed a cyclist (61) and seriously injured a cyclist (72) in Tilburg in December, sat sobbing in court in Breda on Tuesday afternoon. He regretted the huge accident, but wanted to go home as soon as possible to recover from the trauma he suffered from the East Ring Road accident.
There, according to one of the two public prosecutors, things went horribly wrong last year. Heuritis MS (37) drove at 123 kilometers per hour past a line of waiting cars, which were at the red light.
On the other side of the intersection, he scooped the cyclist who was seriously injured. Then his car began to spin, crashed into a corner house and hit another cyclist. He died there.
“I’ll never get in the car again.”
Heuritis MS spoke at length during the first interim session since the accident. He wants to go home as soon as possible. Life in prison is impossible for him, he said.
Since the accident, he has suffered from flashbacks, palpitations and panic attacks, MS told the judges. He was transferred several times in the prisons of Vught and Middelburg, because his complaints do not allow him to settle in any department.
“The accident made a big impression on me,” he says. “I will never get in the car again. I want to wait for my court case at home and process my complaints there.”
“I followed the rules very well, but I had to pick up a PC.”
However, the judge agreed with the prosecutor’s argument. The legal system would be too shocked if MS is released now, the court ruled. Moreover, MS has often said that he would not drive anymore, but he always got behind the wheel.
This is also the case after he drove a cop off his socks with a gulp on the Spoorlaan in Tilburg in July. He was arrested with laughing gas in his car. During his escape attempt, he ran over a police bicycle. It was already the third time he was caught driving without a license.
And yet Heuritis MS got back into the car on December 21 last year. “I followed the rules very well, but I had to pick up a PC or the data would be deleted. That’s why I took a small risk to drive,” says MS. “But that turned out to be a big accident.”
“You have behaved so badly that we do not want to release you.”
The suspect stated that he cries a lot for the suffering he has caused to others. “I pray for them every day,” he said. The Tilburger also wants to pay for all damage.
The court did not want to go into MS’s story yet, but the public prosecutor did take an advance: “You have misbehaved so much that we do not want to release you. Manslaughter and attempted manslaughter, then it will not be explained to us that you should be allowed out of the cell.”
The officer listed what MS has on his conscience. “You did not have a driver’s license and drove recklessly at 123 kilometers per hour through a red light. You had previously said that you would not drive again. You had used drugs and you did not wear glasses or contact lenses, while you know that your vision is severely impaired.”
“You are now suffering from a situation of your own making.”
The officer understands that MS is having a hard time right now. “But you are now suffering from a situation of your own making.”
The substantive hearing of the case is on June 30.
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