Mirror
Sitting in the hospital as the hours crept by, Elizabeth Jimenez was consumed by grief.
Nearby her beloved daughter Maria lay, her life snatched away just weeks before her 24th birthday.
But remarkably, as her mind reeled with unanswered questions and her heart shattered, Elizabeth thought not just of her family and her daughter – she thought too of the man who killed her.
While many mothers would react with fury at the scant details she knew – how Maria had asked friend Nick Tay to take the wheel after a night out because she’d been drinking; how he’d agreed despite the fact he had no insurance, how he’d been speeding (they later discovered at 110mph), crashed the car and survived, while Maria had not – somehow Elizabeth wanted to help him.
“Suddenly I thought ‘Wait a minute, who is with Nick at the police station?’” recalls Elizabeth. “I knew his family lived in Singapore. He must be desperate.’ I had never met this man before. I know that with their daughter killed many would react with furious anger and blame. But all I felt was deep worry for this young man I didn’t know. I just wanted to be by his side.”
Maria was born April 15, 1992. With her three-year old brother Joshua, the family lived in Costa Rica, moving to the UK in 1995 with dad Fernando’s job as a pastor.
“Maria was the happiest little girl,” Elizabeth, now 50, remembers. “She loved ballet and playing the piano, and always had so many friends. She always wanted to help people.”
The family were close from the day she was born. “Maria had a special bond with each of us, says Elizabeth. “She knew she could trust me and her father to support and stand by her, no matter what. We spoke every single day.”
A gifted student Maria spoke English, Spanish and Korean, and studied linguistics at Brighton University.
In 2017, her final year of study, Maria knew what she wanted after graduation.
“She had applied to go to Korea as a teacher and was so excited at the idea. She had her whole life ahead of her.”
Maria spoke to her mum about all aspects of her life, from careers to love.
“It was when Maria was talking about her ex in March 2017 that she first mentioned Nick, a young man who had come to the UK in 2016 from Singapore to study and who was in the same church music group as her. They’d both been through a break up and were supporting each other. Two weeks before the accident she pointed him out to me from across the room.”
On the evening of March 22, 2017, the pair had their daily phone call. Maria talked about her plans for dinner with the music group, and said Nick would also be there. “Maria was her usual happy self. We ended as we always did, by saying I love you. It was the last time we spoke.”
Having just moved from Brighton to Guilford, Surrey, the family were living with different friends as they searched for a home together. That’s why Fernando, now 63, was alone when the police knocked at 6am.
“Nothing prepares you for the news that your child is gone,” he says. “In Costa Rica I was that tough boy from the streets. But at that moment I just collapsed and cried.”
After telling son Joshua, now 32, what had happened the two went to see Elizabeth to break the dreadful news.
“When Fernando knelt down at my feet and began to cry, I thought ‘Oh my god, what is this?’” recalls Elizabeth. “When he told me that Maria was gone, we all just wept together.
“But through the shock and grief I had one question so strongly in my mind. How would I want the world to react if this had been my own son or husband at the wheel? What if it had been me? I instantly put myself in this man’s shoes.”
