Mohy Sharifi has felt unable to speak up till now.
But court hearings are over and she's demanding answers.
She says when Worksafe finally agreed to investigate their case it assured her and her husband
Sia Mosaferi it knew what it was doing.
But instead what happened reflects an internal review exposed by RNZ, that found multiple
serious shortcomings with investigations.
"They didn't care enough.
I, you know, my question to any of these people, to all of these people is that, what if it
was your own kids?
Would you have been happy?
Would you have been satisfied?
Would this be justice to you?
If it was your kids, gone just for nothing?
On holiday for the first time with their two-month-old son at Easter 2018 travelling south on the
Desert Rd the family's Toyota got stuck between two nine-axle, double-tanker trucks.
"I just felt we were just over the moon, we just felt so complete, so happy."
It was a fine dry day.
On a straight stretch 30 kilometres south of Tūrangi, cars in front slowed, and the
truck behind hit them at 79 kilometres an hour.
Mohy Sharifi regained consciousness 10 days later with brain damage and other injuries.
The two boys were killed.
"This is Arteen, he was was four and a half years old and so excited to start school soon
and this is Radeen, just an angel, just an angel."
The police investigated. Eventually, 71-year-old John Barber was convicted of careless driving
causing death, working excess hours and falsifying his logbook.
He was sentenced to three months community detention, 150 hours of community work and
disqualified from driving for 12 months.
The second trucker was convicted of working excess hours and falsifying his logbook.
Both worked for Dynes Transport of Tapanui.
Dynes was convicted of two logbook offences and voluntarily paid the family $32,000 in
reparation.
Dynes declined to talk to RNZ for this story but the family wanted to know who was looking
into the bigger picture and was shocked to discover the Health and Safety watchdog was
not.
"We initially approached WorkSafe and asked for the investigation.
And we when we did, we asked for random drivers to be actually investigated and not just around
the time of the crash, but actually random times in the previous maybe year or something
to actually do a proper investigation. What they have looked into is just these two drivers
and just a week before the crash."
WorkSafe told the family the police were better resourced to investigate.
Finally though, almost 10 months after the crash, and just 10 weeks shy of a deadline
in law to decide whether to prosecute or not, Worksafe began investigating.
At this stage it briefly interviewed the two drivers for the first time.
"A lot of the time was lost because they never started that investigation.
By the time we contacted them they had about two and a half months left.
And within that two and a half months they just wanted to put something together to say
that their investigation was done and that's what we've concluded, but that was not enough.
It was just so limited and so narrow visioned.
Even within that narrow visioned report, there were so many facts that they could take forward,
but they didn't.
Those facts included: Dynes Transport having several prior convictions for having fatigued
drivers and log book offences, the two Desert Road truckers exceeding their work hours two
thirds of the time in the week before the crash and neither of the two cameras in Barber's
truck working, with the cab cam appearing to have been taped over.
WorkSafe decided not to prosecute, but the coroner said it should and gave the agency
extra time to reconsider.
In January this year, for a second and final time, WorkSafe said no.
Mohy Sharifi is sad, and angry and feels terribly let down.
"I'm not taking lightly the efforts of the police, but what they were able to do was
not enough.
It was not enough to bring up the whole truth of this crash, all facts about this crash
and actually fight for what was the real case."
Sia Mosaferi says he has no trust left in the justice system.
The family's lawyer Mark Hammond says it is the saddest case he has seen and he has called
for better resourcing.
The boys' mother does not accept it's too late for change.
"I'd like to just stop you there.
I don't understand too late.
These drivers are out there doing the same culture of driving.
They're driving fatigued, they're driving illegal hours, they're not taking their rest
and they're out there doing it.
So every day there could be a tragedy like this happening and WorkSafe is well aware
of it.
WorkSafe told the coroner its investigation was full and thorough.
It made three recommendations, including encouraging emergency auto-braking on big trucks.
Mohy Sharifi has a PhD in agricultural research, but the crash damaged her memory, ruining
her career.
Mō te hōtaka o te ata, ko Phil Pennington āhau.