Charges dropped for driving tragedy

On a sunny Saturday afternoon in 2019, our client was driving home from the gym. He slowed down as a pedestrian crossed the street, when without warning, the pedestrian’s brother stepped out in front of our client’s vehicle. There was nothing our client could do to avoid the collision, and unfortunately the brother died from his injuries. Our client was charged with dangerous driving occasioning death. We filed a submission with the ODPP (WA) arguing that our client could not in law be found guilty as there was nothing about our client’s driving behaviour which was dangerous or even careless, and that the deceased – who had travelled from Europe to visit family in WA – failed to look in the direction of oncoming traffic before crossing the street. The prosecution accepted our submission and the charge was discontinued.