Sven Larsson

Two years ago, I killed three people in a car accident. I live in Copenhagen, Denmark, and that night I was driving home from work. I’d just picked up my wife and five-year-old daughter from our house, and we were heading to a nearby restaurant. Everything seemed normal, until it wasn’t. Out of nowhere, I had a severe epileptic seizure. My right leg stiffened and pressed down hard on the gas pedal. At 110 km/h, I lost control of the car and crashed into another vehicle.

That night haunts me, not just because of the crash, but because I knew I shouldn’t have been behind the wheel. A couple of months earlier, I’d had a tumor removed from my brain. The surgery went well, and I assumed that chapter was closed. But the doctors had warned me I might still have seizures. They told me not to drive. I took it as a suggestion, not a command. That mistake cost three lives, including a child’s.

In court, I didn’t try to hide anything. I allowed the doctors to confirm I’d been warned, though there was nothing in my medical file to show it. The families of the victims were paid 400,000 Danish kroner each, but what is money when weighed against a human life? The court struggled with my case, and in the end, I received a four-year suspended sentence and a two-year driving ban. It felt like more mercy than I deserved.

After the verdict, I fell into a deep depression. Not because of the sentence—it was fair. It was the weight of my actions that sank in. I took three lives with my negligence. Worse, I endangered my own family, who miraculously survived without injury, though the trauma was enormous.

Last week, I had another seizure, the first since the accident. I went through tests again, and today, I learned that the cancer is back. At 44, I find myself fighting a new battle, but nothing will ever weigh as heavily as the lives I destroyed that night.