Families who lost loved ones in a deadly New South Wales bus crash have launched a class-action lawsuit as the driver responsible was sent to prison for decades.
Brett Button, 59, was sentenced on Wednesday to 32 years in jail, with a non-parole period of 24 years, for killing 10 passengers and injuring 25 who had been celebrating a young couple’s wedding in the Hunter Valley.
He sped up while approaching a roundabout before losing control of the bus, which slammed into a guard rail and rolled on to its side. Button was driving while impaired by an opioid painkiller.
His lengthy sentence came despite the misgivings of crash survivors and victims’ families upset that prosecutors dropped manslaughter charges for lesser driving offences.
In a separate class action filed in the NSW supreme court, survivors, families of victims, first responders and insurance companies have joined forces to target the state’s transport authority and the bus company.
The suit targets Transport for NSW for alleged safety failings on Wine Country Drive at Greta – where Button was driving when the bus carrying 35 wedding guests crashed about 11.30pm on 11 June 2023.
The group is also suing Linq Buslines and two directors, alleging they had failed to do due diligence when hiring Button the previous November.
Adam Bray, whose son Zach was killed in the crash, said the legal action was about holding authorities to account for the 10 “preventable” deaths.
Bray pointed to court evidence that showed the driver had been stood down from another company when taking 40 opiates a week. Button did not declare he was using painkillers when he started working at Linq.
“The court evidence and the police report … clearly showed [Button] was moved on through his addiction and overdosing on opioids,” Bray said.
Linq and Transport for NSW were contacted for comment.
Before being sentenced, Button told the court of his sorrow and shame, and said he did not forgive himself. He claimed he had been using Tramadol since 1994 and had developed a tolerance to the opioid he used to relieve pain.
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The driver had taken 350mg of Tramadol on the day of the crash despite doctors telling him the daily maximum dose was 200mg.
He pleaded guilty to 10 charges of dangerous driving causing death, nine counts of driving causing grievous bodily harm and 16 counts of causing bodily harm by wanton driving.
Bray praised the judge, Roy Ellis, for the lengthy sentence but said it was “bittersweet” because other road-trauma cases had not been met with similar punishments.
“The judge has done an exceptional job to appreciate the gravity and the significance, and in his own words, just the catastrophic, widespread trauma that has ruined hundreds of people’s lives,” he said.
“No amount of years can repair it … [but] historically others victims have not had the sort of outcomes we did.”
Leoni Bowey, whose sister Nadene McBridge and 22-year-old niece Kyah died in the crash, said she was surprised by the “tremendous” sentence but it would never bring them back.
Her daughter Ameliah expressed similar sentiments about the sentence. “Addiction is a disease, I’ll admit that, but no matter what he was still responsible for all those lives, for being the one to bring all those people home,” she said.
