Nancy Paulus: Fruit picker sentenced for careless driving after fatal crash

A Red Cliffs fruit picker who lost control and crashed into a tree, causing the death of a passenger, has been sentenced in court.

Paulus crashed her car into a tree after losing control on the bend of Castle Crossing Road, Nangiloc (Picture: Google maps)

A Red Cliffs fruit picker who lost control of her car and crashed into a tree, causing the death of her passenger and mate, has walked free.

Nancy Paulus, 37, pleaded guilty to a single charge of careless driving in the Mildura Magistrates Court last week.

The court heard in October 2019 Paulus lost control of her car while driving on gravel.

She tried to drive around a curve on Castle Crossing Road in Nangiloc and crashed into a tree.

One of her passengers, a friend and co-worker of Paulus, was severely injured in the crash. The other two passengers, both siblings of Paulus, were not seriously injured.

One of the passengers phoned triple zero but after 10 minutes the man stopped breathing and had no pulse.

Paramedics attempted CPR when they arrived on scene, but she died at the scene.

Paulus’ preliminary breath test and later blood sample came back negative.

Paulus was arrested and charged with dangerous driving causing death and careless driving.

However, an investigation by the Major Collision Investigation Unit determined that Paulus had not been speeding when she lost control of the car and had only been driving at 66km/h in a 100km/h zone.

The more serious offence of dangerous driving causing death was withdrawn.

Magistrate Michael Coghlan noted Paulus had spent 44 days in pre-sentence detention over the matter, despite the maximum penalty for careless driving being an $1800 fine.

Mr Coghlan imposed an eight month corrections order with conviction and ordered that Paulus attend a road trauma awareness seminar.

Her licence had been suspended during her bail.

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