She was just doing her job as she had for years, driving a bus for the local transit authority. She was looking forward to a quiet evening at home with her family—wondering what she would make for dinner and whether there was something good on television that night. As the day lengthened, she pulled up to an intersection—one that was rarely busy at that hour—and rolled through a stop sign just like many people have done a million times, but this time a 69-year-old grandmother was in the intersection and the bus hit her squarely, sending her to the ground. In semi-shock, the driver jumped from the bus and saw blood pooling in the street. Her knees buckled, she called 911, and responders were on-site in minutes. Three weeks later, the grandmother died in the hospital. Her children and grandchildren filled the pews at her funeral and wept at their loss.
The driver was charged accordingly, and despite her quiet, reserved ways, she asked permission to speak to the family and apologize; though she hoped to find some peace, there was none. Restless nights and days looped on an endless videotape in her head, playing the whole scene over and over. She was unable to eat, drink, or sleep; her body was simply beating itself up through guilt and regret. Members of the victim’s family asked to speak to the judge and begged for leniency. They didn’t see any advantage to locking up one grandmother to compensate for the death of another.
At the sentencing, she turned to the family and apologized in some of the most gut-wrenching, sad-beyond-words anyone would ever witness. By the end of her speech, she was grabbing her sides in pain from the sobs and gasps it took to get her through the self-imposed penance.