Renata G, the 46-year-old Polish woman who was responsible for the death of 15-year-old Paula Fornés in Sa Rapita, Majorca in June 2018, was yesterday sentenced to four years and nine months imprisonment.
Paula Fornés was killed when the car being driven by Renata G. left the coast road and invaded the bike lane along which the girl and friends were walking.
The accident occurred at twenty minutes past two in the morning of the 24 June. The teenagers had been returning home after celebrating the Sant Joan Eve festivities. The driver tested positive for alcohol. She was four times over the limit.
She drove off without stopping but was followed by witnesses who eventually took the car keys off her, having contacted the police.
Renata G.’s defence had maintained that the subsequent breath test and procedures were void because the woman had not been read her rights and had not been provided with an interpreter.
The defence had therefore called for her acquittal.
Four years is the maximum tariff for death caused by drink driving. The additional nine months relate to an offence of false documentation. Renata G.’s Polish driving licence was fake.
During the trial over the past few weeks, Renata G. told the court that she had not been offered the services of an interpreter following the fatal accident in June 2018 when she knocked down Paula Fornés.
In addition, she maintained, Campos police had not informed her of her rights.
She also informed the court that she settled in Sa Rapita seven years ago. Her father was killed in a road accident in Majorca, and her mother died shortly afterwards. She suggested that these losses had caused her to become dependent on alcohol.
The court also heard from the forensic doctor who carried out the autopsy. He said that the impact of the car was “so violent that there was no vital reaction by the victim”. The doctor stated that the car had been travelling at up to 60 kilometres per hour on the coastal Avenida Miramar in Sa Rapita. The initial impact, he explained, was with the lower part of the body of the victim, who was then dragged along the tarmac. There were no tyre marks on the body, he noted. The impact caused instant brain death. It had been impossible to revive her. There was “general organ dysfunction”.
Council of Majorca engineers told the court that the road had been perfectly lit on the night of the accident in June 2018 and that there had been reflective indicators to highlight the bike lane to drivers.
One of the victim’s friends stated in court that she has since suffered acute stress.