Eastern Freeway truck driver Mohinder Singh faces victims’ families in court
A truck driver, high on ice and “being stalked by a witch”, sent texts to his boss hours before killing four cops. This was the shocking reply.
A Melbourne court has heard shocking texts from the truck driver who was high on ice and thought he saw a witch before ploughing into and killing four Victoria Police officers in April last year.
Mohinder Singh, 48, ploughed into the four officers near Kew on the Eastern Freeway on April 22 last year in what would become the single deadliest incident in Victorian Police history.
Singh entered guilty pleas to four counts of culpable driving causing death and six other charges in relation to the crash that killed Leading Senior Constable Lynette Taylor, Senior Constable Kevin King and constables Glen Humphris and Josh Prestney.
The officers had earlier pulled over Porsche driver Richard Pusey because he was allegedly speeding. Mr Pusey, who was urinating behind a barrier when Singh’s truck crashed through the emergency lane, later filmed the officers while they were dying.
In the Victorian Supreme Court on Thursday, prosecutor Brendan Kissane QC said Singh had not slept for more than a week and was so affected by drugs that at one point he “couldn’t even speak”.
Mr Kissane said the truck driver spoke with a colleague named Steve the night before the crash who commented that he “appeared physically like he had something on his mind” and “looked ... confused”.
Steve recommended Singh “go and see a doctor” but when Singh raised that with his supervisor on the morning of the crash he was shut down.
The following text messages, exchanged between Singh and his supervisor between 8.52am and 9.12am on April 22, were read out in court:
SINGH:“Hi Simon I saw Steve last night ... I’m going through some hard times at home and other things. I need to come and speak to you about some of them. I don’t know who to tell the story to. I’m going to a doctor about it. When can I come see you.”
SUPERVISOR SIMON TUTERU:“Talk this arvo. I will be in office.”
SINGH:“Ok but Steve saids (sic) I’m not fit to drive.”
TUTERU:“Steve is NOT a doctor.”
SINGH: “Ok thanks.”
Minutes after those texts were sent, Singh returned home where he saw a woman. She would later comment: “He was off it. He was talking nonsense. He was saying witches are coming and we had to leave. I had never seen anyone as drug f***ed in my life.”
Within hours four police officers would be dead and Singh would be arrested.
VICTIMS’ FAMILIES READ HEARTBREAKING STATEMENTS
Sharron MacKenzie, who lost her partner Kevin King in the crash, struggled through a heartbreaking victim impact statement inside court.
Through tears, she read out a statement about her heartbreak, and the heartbreak experienced by the couple’s three young children. She told her husband’s killer he “is not deserving” of any part of her energy.
“Writing this statement has been the most confronting process,” she said.
“I haven’t just lost a partner, I lost the man that was every part of me. We lost the most beautiful, caring, dedicated man who had a heart of gold. He was an incredibly devoted father and family man. I’m here today a broken person.
“There is no way anyone could ever prepare themselves for some devastating news. An incident that was so careless, so unjust, that occurred because of poor choices and should never happened, killed the man I loved and the father of my children.
“There are simply no words to describe the shock, disbelief and gut-wrenching pain that followed. For the first time in my life I understood the feeling of choking pain. Deep and utter despair and felt I could die of a broken heart.
“I’ve not allowed the man responsible to have any part of my energy or being,” she said.
“He is not deserving. His actions have taken Kevin away from us and have drained so much life out of my family. What little energy I have left has been placed into honouring Kevin.”
Andrew Prestney, the father of Josh Prestney, addressed the court after lunch on Thursday.
“How did it ever come to this?” he asked. “Nothing makes sense.”
He said that on the night of the crash, as he and his wife Belinda were preparing dinner, everything was normal. He had a beer and watched half an hour of news. Then he saw the report about police being involved in a fatal crash.
“That’s terrible, I thought,” Mr Prestney said. “Couldn’t be one of the boys. Texts started coming through. Couldn’t be one of the boys.”
He said his son Alex, also in the police force, answered. But Josh did not.
“Josh’s goes through to message bank. ‘Mate, call us as soon as you can.’ Time ticks. Starting to worry me. It can’t possibly be Josh. He’s just starting at highway patrol. Calls to Nunawading Police Station. No one tells us anything.”
Mr Prestney said he knew police would not “tell us over the phone”.
“They’re going to tell us in person,” he said. “There’s headlights outside the neighbour’s place. I raced out into the driveway. Police stepped out. An officer. An inspector. All he says is ‘Andrew, I am so sorry’. I fall to the footpath and scream, ‘No not my boy’. Belinda and I embrace and cry.”
Josh’s brother Alex said he had not returned to work as a highway patrol officer since the day of the crash.
“I carry the pain and the devastation that my mother and father feel,” he said.
“It’s beyond crushing to know that after 28 years as a family, four have become three.”
SINGH SO DRUG AFFECTED ‘HE COULDN’T EVEN SPEAK’
Earlier, in front of Justice Paul Coghlan, prosecutor Brendan Kissane QC read out details of the offending including that the “offender hadn’t slept for eight days”.
He told the court that in the days leading up to the crash, Singh was so affected by drugs that “he couldn’t even speak”.
On the 19th of April, three days before the crash, Singh spent 10-12 hours in a Dandenong motel room where he consumed so much ice that he “struggled to continue using”.
He said that polysubstance abuse and a “lack of opportunity for proper rest” left Singh in a state of “significant fatigue and impairment”.
The court heard that Singh was swerving into and out of the emergency lane on the day of the crash so frequently that a witness commented to a family member: “This dude’s going to f***ing kill someone”.
“Eastlink footage shows the offender’s truck dipping and veering out of its lane,” Mr Kissane said. “Witnesses ... also noticed the offender’s truck dip into the emergency lane.
“The truck drifted completely into the emergency lane for a couple of seconds before veering back on the roadway.”
He said that at the time of the crash, all four police officers were standing between police vehicles and the guard rail. Singh, who claimed he was “cursed” by a witch at the time of the crash, did not apply his brakes despite a collision warning appearing on his vehicle’s dashboard “until the collision occurred”.
“There was no reactive braking until the time of impact,” Mr Kissane said. “The collision resulted in the deaths of all four officers.”
The court heard Singh told his son that he was being followed by a witch in the days before the crash. “He stated he had been seeing a witch that had changed clothes,” Mr Kissane said.
Melbourne Magistrates’ Court previously heard claims from Singh that he saw a witch and the witch put a spell on him.
“I was tired, I was tired, couldn’t sleep cos I was seeing that witch, that witch was – that put a spell on me and I couldn’t sleep at all,” Singh told police in the days after the crash.
A doctor found he had ice in his system which impaired his ability to drive and a fatigue expert found he had a mere five hours of “potential rest” in the three days leading up to collision.
He told police he saw the four officers in front of his truck before the crash.
“I can still see them in front of my truck and I tried to slam the brakes on ‘em and I couldn’t stop it, I couldn’t stop it.”
But court documents state that an analysis of data from the truck’s computer showed Singh didn’t attempt to hit the brakes until the impact.
More to come.
— with NCA NewsWire
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