Prosecutors Say Cleaner Not At Fault For Swedish Train Crash

Sweden-train-crash-REX

The crash of a train into a low-rise apartment building in Sweden last week was an accident and not the fault of a cleaner who was the only person hurt, state prosecutors said on Friday.

Swedish police and prosecutors began an investigation into the accident on Tuesday in which a train ploughed past the end of the line at a depot, vaulted a narrow sidestreet and crashed into an apartment block in the upscale Stockholm suburb of Saltsjobaden.

“Several circumstances point now to the fact that the train began moving due to an accident,” the state prosecution service said in a statement. “There is no longer anything which indicates that the woman drove the train away on purpose.”

The service said it had found serious breaches of security on the train. The woman, who is still in hospital and with whom prosecutors have not been able to speak, was no longer suspected of committing a crime and an order for her detention has been lifted.

Prosecutors began investigating the case as one of endangering the public, but that might now be changed to one of a breach of laws on working conditions, the prosecution service said. [Reuters]