An 81-year-old woman's efforts to make amends after hitting a teenager with her car at an Oamaru pedestrian crossing deserved ''significant credit'', a district court judge said yesterday.
Appearing in the Oamaru District Court for sentencing, Thelma Louise Dunlop, of Oamaru, was discharged without conviction.
The discharge has the support of the victim's family.
She faced a charge of inconsiderate driving causing injury to a 15-year-old schoolgirl on State Highway 1 on September 6.
The court heard that since the crash she had voluntarily surrendered her licence, sold her car and paid the victim $4000 emotional harm reparation.
Judge John Strettell said those actions had been appropriate, deserved significant credit and and the victim's family supported the discharge.
The court heard Dunlop did not see the schoolgirl walking across the Thames Highway pedestrian crossing in Oamaru's North End and failed to give way to the pedestrian.
The 15-year-old landed on the bonnet of the vehicle, hit her head on the windscreen and was thrown 15m from the point of impact.
She suffered a chipped vertebra, a compound fracture to her right ankle and a broken left tibia and was airlifted to Dunedin Hospital, where she remained for eight days.
Immediately after the crash, Dunlop voluntarily surrendered her licence to Land Transport New Zealand.
Since pleading guilty to the charge in October, Dunlop had met the victim and her family through restorative justice.
Defence counsel Ngaire Alexander said the restorative justice conference had been positive and Dunlop had already paid $4000 emotional harm reparation to the victim.
''It was a tragic and unfortunate accident,'' Ms Alexander said.
Dunlop had told Ms Alexander she would never drive again.
Judge Strettell said it was a ''terrible tragedy'' for Dunlop, the victim and her family.
Problems arose with age, he said, and sometimes those problems impaired driving.
