Driver fined £1,000 for crushing woman to death in car park

A 77-YEAR-OLD woman who killed a mother of two after crushing her under her 4x4 in a supermarket car park has been fined £1,000.

Farmer’s wife Jean Bridgeford, 54, was struck, trapped and dragged under a black Land Rover Freelander driven by Paula Grant.

Paramedics raced to the Cromartie car park between Tesco and Lidl supermarkets in Tulloch Street, Dingwall, but she was pronounced dead at the scene.

Grant was heard screaming: “I didn’t see her, I didn’t see her.”

The pensioner, of Old Evanton Road, Dingwall, appeared for sentence yesterday at the town’s sheriff court after admitting causing the death of Mrs Bridgeford by driving carelessly.

The 54-year-old clerical assistant for Highland Council was married to pig farmer Dennis Bridgeford, who was also director of football at Brora Rangers, and a former chairman of NFU Scotland’s intensive livestock committee. Grant was looking for a parking space when she struck Mrs Bridgeford, who was heading to Tesco from her workplace nearby, just before 1pm on 1 August last year.

Depute fiscal Stuart Maciver said she then drove on for several metres before stopping.

He added: “Mrs Bridgeford initially landed on her knees. However the vehicle continued being driven forward and it appears the lady was struck again and was pushed along the road under the vehicle.”

“She was heard saying by a witness ‘I didn’t see her, I didn’t see her. I have killed her. It’s my fault’.”

Mr Maciver told the court that ambulance crews and firefighters rushed to the scene and found Mrs Bridgeford “pinned and wedged under the vehicle, face down”.

He added: “There were no signs of life. The autopsy findings showed the cause of death as severe spinal and chest injuries, as well as injuries to the liver and brain.”

The fiscal said the victim had been brightly dressed, adding that Grant had an eye test afterwards which showed her vision was fine.

Lawyer David Hingston, representing Grant, who cares for her frail husband, told the court: “There are no winners in this case, just losers.”

He said she was very remorseful about the death, which had affected her deeply, adding: “She goes over and over the events in her head. A minute earlier or a minute later scenario is frequently in her thoughts.

“Upmost in her mind is the consequences of the accident and the devastating loss and pain for the Bridgeford family.

“She was looking for a parking space and was looking to the side, not forward. But I can’t explain why neither saw the other.”

Sheriff John Halley told Grant it was a “difficult, sensitive and tragic matter”.

He said he was taking into account Grant’s remorse, personal circumstances and her lack of previous convictions in fining her £1,000. He also banned her from the roads for four years.

Mrs Bridgeford, a keen curler and golfer, lived with husband Dennis at Petley Farm in Portmahomack. They had two sons, aged 22 and 24.