Driver gets 150 hours' community service for fatal bus crash

A 66-year-old man from Rotterdam must do 150 hours of community service for a collision with a line bus on the Kraakweg in Zwartewaal. Naomi, 15, was on the bus and died in hospital days later. The Rotterdam court's sentence matches the demand of the Public Prosecution Service.

The court ruled that the driver did not slow down enough when turning off and did not give way to the bus. The bus ended up in a ditch. "Without the traffic error he made, the fatal outcome would never have occurred," the court wrote in its judgment.

Naomi lay at the front of the bus under a layer of mud. Emergency services found her only after about half an hour.

At the hearing two weeks ago the driver expressed regret and said he had not seen the bus coming.

"A young life was lost," the court wrote in its judgment, adding that deep, irreparable suffering was caused to the victim's relatives. It said the bus driver, too, still feels the effects of the collision.

The court also noted that the man never deliberately wanted to cause a collision, certainly not with these consequences. He will have to live with knowing he caused the crash and was involved in her death, it said.