A woman died of her injuries on Saturday after being hit by a van in Saint-Jérôme in the Laurentians.
The accident occurred around 12:30 p.m. on Bélanger Street, near Curé-Labelle Boulevard.
For an unknown reason, the driver of the van lost control of his vehicle and hit a pedestrian before ending up in the parking lot of a nearby business.
MARIO BEAUREGARD/QMI AGENCY
The pedestrian, a 63-year-old woman, was taken to hospital where she succumbed to her injuries, said Nicolas Scholtus, spokesperson for the Sûreté du Québec (SQ).
The passengers in the van, a woman in her thirties, and three people under the age of 18 were taken to hospital.
While two young people suffered minor injuries, the woman was more seriously injured and a third young man was in critical condition. Around 10:30 p.m. Saturday night, his life was no longer in danger. The driver, a 35-year-old man, was met by the police.
The SQ major crimes division has opened a joint investigation with the Saint-Jérôme Police Department to understand the causes and circumstances surrounding this accident.
According to our information, the driver suffered an epileptic seizure while driving, which caused the accident. “We’re not going to overlook any detail,” commented Élizabeth Marquis-Guy, spokesperson for the SQ, after being questioned about this hypothesis.
In Quebec, people with epilepsy can drive under certain conditions. The Société d’assurance automobile du Québec (SAAQ) requires that they have not had a seizure for a certain period of time before getting behind the wheel.
“Dead loud”
Traffic on Bélanger Street was blocked between Curé-Labelle Boulevard and Laviolette Street to allow investigators and reconstructionists to analyze the scene.
Several witnesses heard the noise of the accident. A person living nearby even witnessed part of the scene.
“The only thing I saw, I stayed in my living room, I saw the truck hit. It was loud as hell, it attracted attention. There were several police officers, ambulances, fire trucks and it was screaming, people had trouble getting out of the truck,” she described.
– With Marie-Michelle Martel and Olivier Faucher, TVA Nouvelles and the Montreal Journal.