The grieving family of a grandmother who was killed in a high-speed head-on crash wept in court as they learned the Newham woman whose negligent driving caused the death would walk free.
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Kim Lavinia Fayers, 53, left Launceston Magistrates Court on Wednesday with a three-month prison sentence which was wholly suspended for two years.
Her failure to slow down at a bend on the Golconda Road at Lebrina caused her Mitsbushi Challenger to cross to the wrong side of the road and plough into 69-year-old Corrie Stone's Mercedes sedan on December 29, 2018.
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Fayers was driving at 100km/h and failed to properly observe a sign which urged motorists to slow down to 55km/h in order to get around the bend safely. She had only driven the Challenger twice before the fatal collision and was used to driving a small Mazda.
When the crash occurred Fayers told police she was in the process of responding to a call from her father in Scottsdale who swallowed methylated spirits.
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Magistrate Sharon Cure told the court no sentence she could impose "would go anywhere near compensating" for the loss Corrie Stone's family suffered.
"She [Fayers] has already suffered the consequences...she is not likely to be driving in any event, nor is she likely to repeat the mistake she made," magistrate Cure said.
It was a complex case and Fayers lived with deep pain and regret over the death of Corrie Stone, magistrate Cure told the court.
When the magistrate handed down the suspended sentence and disqualified Fayers from driving for two years, Corrie Stone's family and friends in the public gallery wept.
"I know nothing's ever going to bring her back but it's just wrong," Corrie's daughter Tammy Stone said outside court.
"To be honest I was hoping for jail time but no amount of time is going to bring mum back."
Ms Stone said harsher laws were needed to help prevent the kind of driving that killed her mother.
"The laws are a joke, they need to change," she said.
"There's so many family's losing their loved ones.
"It breaks your heart... our loved ones mean nothing in the eyes of the law."
In addition to the introduction of tougher penalties for negligent drivers who cause death, Ms Stone called for governments to improve road safety at the bend where her mother died.
"The amount of accidents that have happened on that bend... how many people have to die?"
As she told of her mother's kind spirit, Ms Stone said she felt like the tragic death had destroyed her family.
"She [Corrie Stone] was everything to everyone, she never put herself first," Ms Stone said.
"She was the most caring, loving person who would do anything for anyone.
"It didn't matter what it was, what hour of the day it was, she'd be there in a heartbeat."
Ms Stone revealed that on the day of the fatal crash, her mother's partner Brian Stacey was released from hospital after several days in an intensive care unit.
She said the couple got to spend about 20 minutes together before the crash and Mr Stacey died 11 months later.
The crash happened on the Saturday after Christmas and Ms Stone said had planned to travel to Lebrina to celebrate with her mother on the following Monday.
"I got up to see her but it was in a morgue," Ms Stone said.
"This whole experience has been soul destroying."
