A truck driver whose dodgy and unregistered truck fatally ploughed into an Auckland roadworker has been jailed for three years.
Ashik Ali was sentenced for manslaughter at the High Court in Auckland over the killing of Jonathon Walters in Remuera in May 2024.
Walters was taken to hospital in a critical condition and died two days later.
Ali’s truck, laden with 20 tonnes of roading material, rolled backwards towards the roadworkers when the brakes failed, hitting Walters and running over his legs and pelvic area.
Its last Certificate of Fitness was in 2019, and it had a non-operation order issued in 2021.
Walters’ death was preventable, the Crown said.
“Mr Ali’s truck was in such a poor state of repair it should not have been on the road,” prosecutor Clare Antenen told Justice Graham Lang.
“Mr Ali’s truck had been stopped on many occasions by police vehicle safety teams. The truck had been inspected and had been found to have very serious safety defects, including an air leak to the breaking system.”
She said a non-operation order had been issued against the truck and there was a history of non-compliance stretching from 2018 to 2022.
The truck had also been given “at various times” either pink or green stickers.
“In any event, the truck was driven by Mr Ali on more than one occasion completely disregarding the orders by the police in relation to the truck,” Antenen said.
“The Crown submits the death of Mr Walters is a direct result of Mr Ali refusing to comply with the orders he was given to maintain a roadworthy truck, to keep his truck in a state where it would not cause injury to others on the road.”
‘I did not get a chance to say goodbye’ – victim’s sister
The Crown’s comments came after tearful victim impact statements from whānau were given in court.
Walters’ sister, Karin Fraser, was in anguish as she explained how she never got to Auckland before he died.
“He had already passed, I did not get a chance to say goodbye,” she said.
“Being denied that has caused long-standing mamae that I will carry for the rest of my life,” she said.
Fraser said her brother was a loving father and devoted uncle and a steady presence for the whānau’s tamariki.
“His absence has left a painful gap for our younger whānau and our younger generations,” she said.
Fraser said she since has had deep concerns for other family members doing the same work.
“Because of your actions, I now carry a consistent anxiety that they too may go to work one day and not return to their whānau,” she told Ali.
Walters’ niece, Aliyah Tautahi-Fraser, said his mokopuna have been robbed of a life that includes him.
“How we can we ensure the safety of these whānau members to make sure that this doesn’t happen again?” she asked.
Ali’s lawyer, Ron Mansfied, KC said he was in a financial bind and desperate.
“He couldn’t afford to keep the truck roadworthy and he also couldn’t afford to turn away work and it was that sense of desperation that has let to the truck not being repaired and roadworthy and him accepting the job which was offered,” he said.
Mansfield said Ali feared he would not be offered work again.
He said Ali made a grave mistake that had resulted in a terrible loss.
“He never contemplated this… he never wanted it, he should have thought it through, he didn’t but certainly this was not offending he intended or envisaged.”
Justice Lang, before jailing Ali, told him his financial pressures did not justify using the truck and putting others at risk.
His actions fell well short of what would be expected of a reasonable person, Justice Lang said.
Justice Lang said Walters’ death has had catastrophic consequences for his family and workmates.
The National Road Carriers Association earlier said it was systemic failure that killed Walters.
It was a call the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) rejected at the time, when it said an individual was to blame and not a system.
“NZTA had applied the regulatory levers available to identify the poor state of the vehicle and to address the immediate risk to public safety,” it earlier told RNZ.
“Regardless, an individual subsequently made a decision to illegally drive this unregistered and unsafe vehicle after it had been ordered off the road.”
rnz.co.nz
