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A district court judge was jeered today after passing a non-custodial sentence on a former policeman over a horror accident in Waikato more than two years ago.
Judge Anne Kiernan in Auckland District Court sentenced Jason Connell Peters to 12 months' home detention, banned him from driving for two years and ordered him to pay $29,000 reparation.
He had earlier admitted three charges of careless driving causing injury and his third drink driving charge, relating to an accident at Maramarua on the Hauraki Plans on May 12, 2006, which injured several people and left one woman, Michelle Davies, fighting for her life.
Mrs Davies stood in front of Peters as he sat in the dock to read her victim impact statement, but was told by the judge to stand further back in the body of the court.
"What a joke," Mrs Davies said.
Moments later as the judge left the court following the sentencing, Mrs Davies yelled she was "absolutely appalled" at the home detention.
To members of the Peters family supporting him on the other side of the public gallery, she said: "Shame on you."
Mrs Davies had struggled to hold her emotions in check as she told the court how the crash had changed her life and her family's life forever.
She said it happened two weeks after she and her husband Greg had got married and just after they had returned from their honeymoon.
The court heard that the accident happened while Peters was driving from a corporate event where he had been drinking.
His erratic driving forced other cars to take evasive action as he passed on blind corners and overtook other vehicles through an intersection.
He then pulled out in front of oncoming traffic, hitting the Davies' car virtually head on.
Mrs Davies was trapped for 45 minutes and her husband, Greg, and six-year-old daughter thought she was dead.
As help arrived Peters ran off and was later spotted by a police helicopter hiding behind a tree 900 metres away.
Mrs Davies told the court she had broken bones, and brain and head injuries.
Her family was told she would die.
She recovered slowly and painfully but more than two years later she said she "never felt awake".
She was once a fit and agile woman who ran her own interior design business but now she had to sleep twice a day and was sluggish, slow and clumsy.
"Every day I struggle to do things that were once easy."
She said her husband suffered post-traumatic stress syndrome from watching his wife struggle for her life straight after their wedding.
She said she and her family took "very little sense of sincerity" from a letter of apology from Peters.
Greg Davies' voice also cracked as he told the court of the emotional turmoil the family had endured.
"Our lives will never be the same. Our loss is immeasurable," he told the court
Mrs Davies' father Robert Wells said her recovery was painful and slow.
She would open her eyes but see nothing and there were months of unintelligible speech.
"I remember the day she said `Dad, I know I have been talking nonsense, you won't let me get away with it will you?' It was real milestone."
The court heard Peters, a policeman for 10 years, had been convicted of drink driving in 1998 and 2003.
His lawyer Paul Davison QC said Peters' apology was sincere but, for legal reasons, could not be made earlier.
When he left the scene he was injured and stunned, Mr Davison said.
"No, he was drunk," interjected a supporter of the Davies family.
Mr Davison said Peters fully accepted responsibility for the accident and profoundly regretted it.
Judge Kiernan ordered Peters to pay $25,000 he had offered in reparation and a further $3764 to two insurance companies.
He was not to leave his home, drink alcohol or take drugs and has do an assessment for alcohol abuse.
- NZPA
