Losing a child is perhaps one of the hardest things one has to face in life. But losing two of your small children in a horrific accident is absolutely unfathomable.
This family went through one of the worst tragedies any family can go through, all because of a drunk driver.
On 5th February, four-year-old Gracie-Ann Lucas and her three-year-old brother Jayden-Lee Lucas were in their car, going back home from a birthday party. Accompanying the children was their mother Rhiannon Lucas and one of her friends.
It was just like any other drive back home, until suddenly their car was hit by a van on the M4. The siblings in the back of the car died within days of each other after the horrible accident.
While the siblings were alive at the scene of the crash and were rushed by emergency services to a hospital for immediate treatment, they did not survive in the following days. Gracie-Ann was in bad condition and passed away a day after the accident. Meanwhile, the doctors gave the family hope by saying Jayden was stable but he succumbed to his injuries five days later as well.
The van was being driven by 41-year-old Martin Newman. It was discovered that at the time of the accident, Newman had alcohol and drugs in his system.
Police who responded to the scene discovered that Newman was driving with twice the amount of alcohol in his system than is legal for driving. Newman said that the day before he had gone out drinking vodka with his colleagues and after he returned to the hotel room he had 10 cans of Strongbow and had also taken cocaine.
When the accident happened, Newman said that he had been attempting to drive back to Wales and was ‘completely shattered’ from the night before and as a result had nodded off at the wheel a few times. He also had a bottle of wine in his car’s cup holder to help with his ‘dry mouth.’
