AIBU to send a message to the man who killed my aunt?

[IcyJoMarch]

My aunt (by marriage) died in a car accident a little over two years ago. She was American and lived there, and her American family refused all contact with me and another relative, and contacting the lawyers she had used in a lawsuit also got no response, so the only information I have is the police crash report, which was released a few months later. It’s extremely well-documented, including photographs and a schematic of the details. She was making a U-turn in front of a lorry. The lorry driver is named in the report, as was his company.

I haven’t been obsessed with this, but every so often I remember it and think about how awful he must feel. The report is strictly factual and does not assign blame, but even if he were 100% blameless, he still caused the death of two people (my aunt’s best friend was in the car with her). I honestly think he was in no way to blame because my aunt pulled out in front of him on a road which had little traffic. She was not a bad driver - the report stated she had only one driving-related incident, over twenty years before, when she was a little over the speed limit - but I find it difficult to understand whether she simply misjudged distance or was distracted or….

Really, I am wondering if this was a deliberate suicide attempt on her part. My uncle died in horrible circumstances during the pandemic, and my aunt sued his nursing home for neglect (and won). I visited her several months before her death because I was there for a work conference and she was clearly still deeply unhappy. The only thing that gives me pause is the presence of her best friend, but I still can’t rule it out.

I’m just wondering if it would be appropriate for me to contact the haulage company and ask them to pass on an anonymised message to say that I hope he got the support he needed and that, on my part at least, I don’t blame him. (I’m not sure how to phrase that.)

YABU - there is no need to do this
YANBU - it would be okay for you to do this

I will be travelling for the next several days so if I don’t respond, please know I am reading every response.

But the context here is that the aunt was on another continent, and the actual blood relatives won’t engage with OP on this topic.

Inappropriate stay out of it

@Deerinflashlights - no, i don’t think i’m more central or more important than children or siblings. Obviously, they are closer. But no, i don’t think I’m a distant relative either. Why suggest there are only 2 extremes in family tree relationships? There is middle ground here.

OP please don’t contact this poor man. I can only imagine the trauma he has already suffered and he didn’t kill your aunt she died in an accident. Probably a two second lapse of judgement on her part with tragic consequences. Could you go to visit her grave or something like that to help you process it all.

YANBU to want to reach out, but as an American and can 99% guarantee he wont respond because his company will think this is an attempt to sue them for damages. I am sure the case was settled and now they want no contact with any family members.

the man who killed my aunt

It wouldn't even occur to me to think of him in that way. He didn't kill anyone unless he was convicted of dangerous driving which it sounds like he wasn't. Imagine the poor bloke getting a letter from a complete unknown 2 years after this terrible RTA forgiving him for "killing your aunt".

I'm not sure who you're thinking of here but it ain't him!

I haven’t been obsessed with this

I think you are, though.

I'm sorry your aunt died. But she lived on another continent, she was an aunt by marriage and her own siblings have declined to discuss any of this with you. I also think going through the police report is a bit odd. I have an aunt and uncle who live overseas and I'd be very sad to hear that one of them had died, but I wouldn't start poring over police reports and trying to figure out whether it was an accident or suicide, or messaging a haulage company (two years later?!) to commiserate with the driver.

You can be sad about your aunt, of course, but this does feel an awful lot like obsession to me and a touch of Main Character Syndrome.

Trying to reply without being too outing, but my sister was hit by a car and killed when she was in her teens. I don’t want to give too many details, but the circumstances of the crash meant it was everyone’s “fault” and also no one’s. Just an awful mess of circumstances really. But for some reason, maybe self protection, I dunno, I’ve never felt too desperate to understand fault. It wouldn’t change anything. What I have done is spend over 20 years now wondering how the driver is doing. He was driving and his pregnant wife was next to him, and I just can’t get my head around how much it must have affected them both. I google him sometimes but I’ve never been sure if I’ve found him. But I’ve always thought that if I could, I’d tell him I hope he’s okay and I am okay, and I “forgive” him. That said, I don’t know how appropriate it would be to do, so I’ve never pursued it. I really understand your thought process though 💐

Ultimately you don't actually know what happened. Even putting the possibility of suicide aside, you still don't know if there was negligence on the part of the truck driver, even if your aunt did make a foolish manoeuvre.

So to contact the lorry driver, when you live a continent away and don't have enough detail to know exactly what happened would be unwise. And basically it's not your place to do that, even if you did know the full details.

As for the connection, I'm very very close to my late husband's family. More so than my own, tbh. His aunts and uncles call me their niece. His cousins call me their cousin. The in-law thing was dropped long ago. I'm family.
But I still wouldn't insert myself into anything that my aunt's children were dealing with.

I wouldn't say you hoped he got the support he needed but I would say you hope he doesn't blame himself as it was an accident.

OP - I think you’re coming from a good place, and you obviously cared for your aunt. But you have no idea what kind of place this man is in. Maybe he’s been in therapy ever since, and this letter could throw a real spanner in the works. Alternatively, he might be a very pragmatic person who genuinely gets that this wasn’t his fault and has moved on.

Be honest - are you really doing this for him, or for you? What if you can get this letter to him and you never get a reply? You won’t know if it brought him peace; you won’t know if he was upset, or furious, or indifferent. You won’t know if the firm just binned it, or even if they still have contact details for him.

Be kind enough to yourself, him and your aunt’s family to let this go.

@IcyJoMarch No OP. Don't do that. It was two years ago and all you'll achieve is bringing it all back to the driver. He's undoubtedly had counselling since then and you could set him back to square one. He also just might view your letter as being sinister, like stalkerish behaviour from the woman's relative. Are you quite young by any chance?

By the sound of it he didn't kill your Aunt.
It's wrong of to write, let alone think that he did.

This was two years ago, least said soonest mended.

I am actually closer to an uncle by marriage than to most of my blood uncles. Blood isn´t everything you know.

There is t middle ground when it comes to writing an anonymous letter saying that a person is forgiven for something. The bloke won’t think ‘oh, a letter from a niece by marriage from another continent’. He will assume it’s from the woman’s close family.

Back off. The family has gone no contact with you and it's not your place to try to make contact through the truck driver and through his work? WTF are you thinking?

You're trying to insert yourself into something that the family doesn't want you involved in.

But you say it was her fault so she killed herself and her friend. And risked his life. He didn't kill anyone and it was obviously traumatic.

It would be crass beyond words to send a communication to a US based haulage company.

Asking them to pass on a message that two years after the event, you, a complete stranger from another country, don't blame this driver for a fatal RTC that was the fault of your distant family member?!

It's every kind of wrong and makes it seem like you're trying to shoehorn your feelings into people's lives when you don't even know them?

You're not a character at all in this, never mind the main one.

Plus coming up with a weird theory about her mental state aka making shit up and wanting to send anonymous messages to the driver's work?

I'm going to be blunt. You're thinking about shit stirring over a fatal accident 2 years afterwards and you need to stop.

Ok, but the siblings of the people married to your aunts and uncles won’t think a lot about you.
My aunt (married to mum’s brother) had lots of siblings. She was as much my aunty as he was my uncle. I never met her many siblings or their dc though. She was my family, that doesn’t mean her family saw me as family.

But his siblings probably aren’t close to you.

Let's imagine for a moment that you do contact him, he reads the message, and is enormously comforted by it.
Somehow he then ends on local or social media talking about it - maybe he's campaigning for mental health support, or on a report about restorative justice or similar.

Your aunt's close family and friends, and the close family and friends of her passenger, see this report and hear of someone ON THEIR BEHALF absolving the driver of the lorry that killed their loved one.

How do you think that would feel for them?

I appreciate it's an improbable scenario but I think it illustrates how enormously inappropriate your idea is.

What else is happening for you that you are projecting?

I am very sorry you are going through this. My sister died in a car accident with a lorry many years ago and I recognise some of the thought processes you have described from the immediate aftermath.

While it's fine to feel sympathy with the driver of the lorry, you don't know how your words will land. He may have moved on already and this brings it all back. He may be wracked with guilt and the words bring comfort. It might make him angry that you think that he needs forgiveness and find it patronising. He may have lost his job and feel resentful.

Your instinct is to go from a passive observer of these tragic events to becoming an active participant. Maybe that's how you always deal with problems. But your words and actions have no power to make any real difference to outcomes here. What is done is done.

I think you need to find a way to make peace with that powerlessness. You can start thinking about that now , or you can try and fight it by contacting the haulage company. The choice is yours.