Two young passengers who survived a New Year’s Eve fatal car crash told a bystander they had all been drinking the day of the crash, a Ballarat jury has been told.
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Nurse Jennifer Cameron told the jury on Wednesday she spoke to a male and female passenger after arriving at the crash scene on the Buninyong-Mount Mercer Road on December 31, 2015.
“The male told me he had been drinking and smoking weed that day and he was still drinking in the car,” Ms Cameron said.
“They had all been drinking and had drugs on board.”
Ms Cameron said the two passengers told her the car had been travelling too fast and they wanted the driver to slow down.
“The boy was sitting in the back seat. They had all been asking (the driver) to slow down,” she said.
Ms Cameron said the female passenger told her she was sitting in the front and had been drinking that afternoon.
Gemma Paige Sargent, 19, is on trial in the County Court at Ballarat, charged with culpable driving causing death, dangerous driving causing death, negligently causing serious injury and dangerous driving causing serious injury.
Another witness, Michael Bolton, told the jury a white sedan overtook his vehicle about 7.45pm on the Shelford-Mount Mercer Road.
He said he was travelling about 130km/h when the car overtook him. He said the car’s wheels and brakes then locked up and it slid into a culvert. His wife phoned triple-0.
The sedan rolled an unknown number of times and came to rest on its roof in a paddock, the jury was told.
The jury visited the crash scene in the Mount Mercer area on Wednesday morning, before hearing from three witnesses.
The trial will continue on Thursday before judge James Montgomery.
