Daughter to sue methadone programme over road death

A woman whose mother was killed by a methadone patient in a car crash plans to sue the Blenheim methadone programme for negligence.

Luke Voice, 31, was sentenced last week to two years and seven months in prison after pleading guilty to driving under the influence of methadone and Triazolam and causing the death of Picton woman Mary Radley at Koromiko on August 26, 2004.

But Mrs Radley's daughter, Rachael Ford, said the real culprit was the Nelson Marlborough District Health Board, which had failed to supervise Voice adequately.

"He may have killed my mother, but they loaded the gun," Ms Ford said.

A nurse, who used to work at a methadone clinic herself, Ms Ford said New Zealand had "one of the slackest methadone programmes in the world", and the way methadone was administered was putting addicts - and the public - at risk.

"Stable" methadone users are supposed to be checked by a doctor every three months but Voice, who was far from stable, had not seen his prescribing doctor for a year, despite the fact his tests were consistently "dirty".

The police investigation found he was "wasted" when he went into the chemist for his methadone that morning, yet the chemist dispensed it anyway.

He was still in a trance-like state when police interviewed him in hospital, and he told them he had no memory of the crash.

A report by the Health and Disability Commissioner in March found the service knew that Voice was abusing drugs and had a tendency to drive while under the influence, but failed to do anything about it.

Six months before killing Mrs Radley, Voice had crashed into a parked car, wrecking three vehicles. He was charged with careless driving, fined and ordered to do a remedial driving course in July 2004.

One month later, the fatal accident occurred.

The Health and Disability Commissioner said the clinicians should have reported Voice to the authorities, instead of merely informing him that his place on the programme could be reviewed.

Ms Ford, who was co-founder of the Candor Trust, an organisation that aims to educate about drugged driving, said although she was "95 per cent happy" with the commissioner's report, it "failed to connect the dots".

The commissioner had believed the methadone programme's claims that the class B drug had no adverse effect on driving, and it was only because Voice was "polydrugging" that his driving was impaired.

But Ms Ford said she had been able to produce overwhelming evidence from international studies which showed methadone affected driving.

The family had hoped for an apology from the health board and had sought meetings with officials, but instead the board had tried to blame it on individual staff.

Nelson-Marlborough District Health Board alcohol and drug service manager Eileen Varley said the methadone programme was sound.

"We do have a lot of compassion for the victim's family, but we can't be responsible for everything our clients do."

- NZPA