The Road Safety Office, has presented a study, which analyzes the causes of the death of 68 children in 67 traffic accidents between 2008 and 2010. And it is that the data offered are alarming. In 2010 79 children died in traffic accidents, compared to 60 dead in 2009, according to figures from the General direction of traffic. In 15 percent of cases, minors were crushed by another occupant of the vehicle or fired out of the vehicle. 46% of fatalities did not use any restraint system in the car. The prosecution estimates, according to the data of its study, that if all the children had taken a chair suitable for their age and height, 51% of the deaths would have been avoided.
Bartolomé Vargas, Fiscal Coordinator of Road Safetyexplained that the Prosecutor's Office for Minorsmay suspend guardianship or take protective measures for a minor, in the event that the driving parents are sanctioned at least three times for not using an adequate child protection system. For this, traffic accidents in which a minor is killed or seriously injured, will be investigated to determine the responsibility of the parents, who can be punished with up to four years in jail.
For all these reasons, an action protocol will be initiated, to investigate in depth the causes of traffic accidents in which a child under 14 years of age is killed, said protocol will include a autopsy of the deceased child with data related to his weight and height, to be able to determine, if he was in his seat at the time of the accident and if it was adequate.
If after this investigation they determine that the child would have saved the life with an adequate protection element, the prosecutor may impute to the parents occupying the vehicle, not only to the driver, a crime of manslaughter or serious injuries due to imprudence and impose a penalty of up to four years in prison. In these cases, alleging ignorance of security measures will not serve as an excuse.
Too, Bartolomé Vargas, he acknowledged that if sanctions and criminal intervention are important, education or prevention is much more important, so he believes that a legal reform is necessary to promote road education in the schools he currently believes is scarce.
Is our duty to make the children travel with adequate protection.
In kids and more | What types of chairs to use in the car for kids, Tips to increase the safety of children when we travel by car Image | Thomas Widmann
