Tourist who caused fatal crash ordered to pay $15k

File photo / NZ Herald

A German tourist who caused a fatal car crash in Southland on Boxing Day has been ordered to pay the woman's family $15,000 for emotional harm.

Mario Pieper, 43, of Germany, was sentenced in the Invercargill District Court this afternoon.

Southern Institute of Technology student Pengxiao Tao, 22, known as Jessica, a Chinese national, died two days after the crash on the Athol Five Rivers Highway.

The crash happened when the campervan Pieper was driving turned right from State Highway 6 on to SH97, heading towards Mossburn.

Peiper and his family were in New Zealand on holiday. One of the two children in the campervan was treated at hospital, while the other child and adult in the campervan were treated at the scene.

Two other people in Ms Tao's vehicle, the driver and another passenger, were also hospitalised.

On December 30 Pieper pleaded guilty to one charge of careless use of a vehicle causing death and two charges of careless use of a vehicle causing injury.

He was allowed home to Germany, but returned for today's sentencing.

On the careless driving causing death charge Piper was fined $1000 and ordered to pay $130 court costs, disqualified from driving for two years and ordered to pay Ms Tao's family $15,000 in emotional harm reparation. The reparation is to be paid today.

On the two careless driving causing injury charges, Pieper was disqualified from driving for two years, and ordered to pay $2500 to each victim.

Judge Michael Turner said he accepted the crash was caused by a momentary lapse of concentration on Pieper's part and that there was no deliberate intention to cause harm, but said consequences of that moment's carelessness were catastrophic.