The colleagues would only go and buy dinner.
But on the way there, they crashed straight into a tree – at 154 kilometers per hour.
Robin, 21, and another young man died.
– So I braked. But the car did not stop, says the driver, who has now been charged.
The article in brief
■ Two young men died when a car crashed into a tree at 154 km/h on a 70 freeway.
■ The driver, who did not have a driver’s license, is charged with several serious crimes.
■ Witnesses tell of attempts to hide who was driving, and of the woman driving recklessly all week.
■ The driver denies wrongdoing, and says she was disturbed during the journey and that the brakes were bad.
It’s getting close to 02:00 on June 6 when a group of young adults, who are on training outside Gävle with their new job, decide to drive to McDonald’s.
Two people who are sober get behind the wheel of two of the company’s cars, which they can borrow during the training week.
Then one of them, according to witnesses, “takes off at high speed”.
Soon, those traveling in the second car see the driver of the first one waving at them from the side of the road. The car she has been driving is in a forest.
It’s completely soaked and bloody, and the roof is torn away.
– We saw that the car was lying there, I don’t understand how it ended up there, but it must have flown and bounced, one of the passengers in the other car tells the police.
– There are horrible images in my head.
Didn’t have a driver’s license
In the police investigation, it appears that the driver, a 25-year-old woman, drove at 154 kilometers per hour – on a 70-lane road. In a curve, she went off the road, and crashed into a rock and a tree.
Then, according to witnesses, she tried to convince her colleagues in the other car to lie and say that she was not the one driving.
Two people died in the crash: the 21-year-old ice hockey fan Robin Henriksson from Kalix, and another man in his 20s.
Another passenger, a woman in her 30s, was seriously injured.
Now the driver has been charged with two counts of grossly causing death of another, grossly causing bodily harm, illegal driving and gross negligence in traffic.
The woman, who has never had a driver’s license, admits to illegal driving but denies other crimes.
The defense: Bad brakes and tires
In questioning, she says that the others asked her to drive because they themselves had been drinking, and that she “finally said yes”. But it was a messy journey, according to the woman, who says that, among other things, alcohol was spilled and cigarettes and lighters were “thrown around” in the car. She states that she was also disturbed by the passengers pulling her and trying to take her phone to change the music.
Advertisement
She then decided to stay, but says it didn’t work out.
– Why I drove off the road was for three reasons. Very bad brakes. And really bad tires. When I braked like that… The brakes barely worked, they were so bad. And the tires had such a poor grip on the road, says the driver.
Witnesses: Driving too fast earlier
She continues:
– And then I thought that it is better that I drive into the forest than to drive into all the other vehicles that come in front of me. I don’t know if it was so good in retrospect because there were such serious injuries.
If she drove at 154 kilometers per hour, it was because she accidentally stepped on the gas when she was disturbed, the woman believes.
However, colleagues state that she had been driving recklessly and too fast all week, and that they tried to talk to her to get her to drive more carefully.
The police have not found any defect or damage to the car, which could have caused the crash.
