A decision of the investigating judges in accordance with the requisitions taken last September by the prosecution.

The prosecutor of the Republic of La Rochelle, Laurent Zuchowicz, indicates this Friday in a press release that in the case of the accident of a school bus in Rochefort (Charente-Maritime) in 2016, which left six dead and ten injured including two serious, “the Eiffage company benefited from a dismissal, while the driver of the truck involved in the accident was referred to the criminal court.

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Rochefort bus case: the investigating judges have just issued their order.

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- La Rochelle Public Prosecutor (@PRLaRochelle) November 5, 2021

The Eiffage company, indicted at the end of 2020 for manslaughter, is the owner of the dump truck whose side wall (rear metal wall holding the load in place) had gutted the bus.

But according to the prosecutor, "the legislation in force at the time of the facts did not make it possible to sufficiently characterize the offenses".

At the time, no standard required trucks to have an alert system that would have warned the driver that the side of the truck had remained open.

On the other hand, the driver was dismissed “for having by clumsiness, recklessness, inattention, negligence or breach of an obligation of prudence or safety…” caused the death of six people.

Trial scheduled for March 28-30, 2022

On the morning of February 11, 2016, in Rochefort, while it was still dark and it was drizzling, the coach crossed at around 7.15 am the road of a dump truck, which left an Eiffage warehouse 800 meters away .

The side of the coach had been sheared by the open side of the truck, killing six of the fifteen teenagers on board: five high school students and a middle school student.

Ten others were injured, two of whom were unable to work for less than three months.

A few days after the accident, the driver, then 23 years old, was indicted for manslaughter and unintentional injury, and left free under judicial supervision.

This tragedy was one of the most serious child transport accidents to have occurred in France since the one in Beaune in 1982 (53 deaths including 44 children).

Subject to appeal, the trial will be held from March 28 to 30, 2022 before the correctional court of this city, announced the prosecutor.

Miscellaneous

Mayenne: A school bus accident leaves several injured

Bordeaux

Rochefort: More than an hour of reconstruction to understand the drama

  • Aquitaine

  • Justice

  • Poitou-Charentes

  • La Rochelle

  • Teenager

  • Truck

  • Accident

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