BUKIT MERTAJAM: “Mummy, I’m so in pain!” After a cargo container crushed Lee Zi Rou, 21, she still managed to utter these last few words before dying.
Despite the agony, she summoned the strength to grab her phone, call her mother.
“The call came at 9.24am. I became afraid even before I answered the call, as I sensed something was wrong.
“I asked her where she was, but there was no reply,” said her mother, who wanted to be known only as Lim, 42, in a tearful video interview recorded by China Press yesterday.
Immediately, Lim asked another daughter to drive her through the route she knew Lee usually commuted to go to work.
She kept calling Lee’s phone to no avail until eventually, a man answered and told her Lee’s location and that she was crushed under a cargo container.
Through racking sobs, she told reporters how, when she got there, she frantically begged bystanders to help get her daughter out.
“But there was no way. The cargo container was too heavy. Nobody could help.
“She called me at 9.24am and by 9.32am when I reached there, she was dead,” Lim cried.
The mother said she could still hear Lee’s final words.
“I thought there was some chance to save her because she had the strength to call. But it was not to be,” she sobbed.
Lee’s funeral will be on Sunday at 10am, and her remains will be cremated at Berapit Crematorium.
At a magistrate’s court here yesterday, the 51-year-old trailer driver was ordered to be remanded for four days to assist in investigations.
Magistrate Mohd Harith Mohd Mazlan issued the remand order until Sunday.
When the driver was brought to the magistrate’s court at 8.20am, he flashed a “V” sign twice to the waiting reporters.
Seberang Perai Tengah OCPD Asst Comm Helmi Aris stated that the driver was being investigated under Section 41 (1) of the Road Transport Act 1987 for the offence of causing death by reckless driving, which is punishable with up to 10 years jail, a fine of up to RM50,000, and disqualification of the driving licence for between 10 and 20 years.
ACP Helmi said preliminary tests for substance abuse and alcohol turned up negative.
Lee lost her life at the Jalan Bukit Tengah junction on Wednesday when the driver of the trailer lost control while negotiating a left turn and the cargo container toppled over and crushed her car.
The falling container almost flattened the driver’s side of the car. The container also slammed into the driver’s side of another car.
Its driver, Tan Chou Theng, 25, was rescued by passers-by and is said to be hospitalised with serious injuries.
