To actually feel sorry for the woman driving the car in the Wimbledon car accident

[bagpuss90]

I’m sure I’ll be flamed here . I totally sympathise with the bereaved parents- I can’t stress that enough. I can understand them wanting justice . As we know the driver of the car suffered an epileptic seizure at the wheel - she had no history of epilepsy. I don’t see what she could have done differently. She has to live with what she did although it wasn’t her fault. AIBU to feel quite sorry for her ?

Not true at all re epilepsy. I’m waiting to get a confirmed diagnosis atm.,

Of course you don't have any memory of something when you're unconscious!
When I had seizures I would remember nothing from 30 mins or so before and then would just wake up on the floor feeling cold, confused, exhausted and want to sleep
It's like you've not slept for a week, people are talking too loudly telling you to stay awake and your whole body hurts

Very tragic.

Seizures can and do happen with no warning. Given how serious the outcome of the accident was, I'm sure the hospital would have confirmed driver had a seizure by a brain CT or MRI scan? I thought epileptic seizures can be detected and confirmed this way?

Hospitals also routinely tox screen patients who present like this (in case the seizure was caused by drugs, medications, alcohol) and she would have been tested for all sorts of other conditions that can cause sudden loss of consciousness?

When I was a child, our neighbour (in his early 40s, with 2 young children at home) had a seizure behind the wheel and crashed into a man walking with his grandson on the pavement. The man was killed, along with the driver, but the boy survived. They discovered he'd had a seizure, no history of epilepsy or underlying medical conditions, just an accident.

@FateReset they did do a scan and did prove she’d had a seizure, that’s why there’s no charges to answer for. She’d had no history of seizures before (and as posters have extensively covered, many people have their first seizure as adults). It was a tragic accident, absolutely heartbreaking for all involved.

They are. But then other people are entitled to point out that a court examination of a case the CPS don't think has sufficient merits to prosecute is a stupid idea. And to list all the reasons why.

If the review of the police investigation throws up anything different, any new evidence or whatever, that could of course change. It may well be worthwhile then. As things stand though, it remains a stupid idea, and there were people coming out with this before we found out about the review. There's another thread in Chat about this case and some of the claims on it are rather, erm, tall.

You don’t tend to remember things that happen when you’re unconscious following a seizure.

I wish posters throwing out totally fake information such as her selling cars or appearing in magazines after the accident would take their fake news posts down when they are debunked. Or even the mods. These insinuations and distortions have a way of seeping into the narrative and become embedded facts.

We've all seen it recently with Nicola Bulley and Jay Slater. The forums become a toxic feeding frenzy or misinformation and outright lies.

Given the intelligent, insightful comments on here I think we can dismantle the justice system and turn any investigations over to Mumsnet!

There are so many stupid comments on this thread.
There are so many vile comments on this thread.
There are so many stupid and vile comments on this thread.

This place really can be awful.

lemmein
I’m shocked but sadly not surprised by some of the comments on here tbh .

So she was a witness to the crash but wasn't even interviewed? Have I read that correctly? In such an awful situation with so many injuries and 2 deaths would they not have questioned every single witness? I mean I know their over worked etc but surely this would be a priority. It makes me wonder with the backlog of phones that need to be checked and lack of tech forensics did they even check her phone

Where was she coming from? That’s what makes me curious. Had she been playing golf? The golf course is the only place she could have been coming from really. Was she hungover?

Where's your evidence for that?

Due to the location and type of school it's highly likely that all those involved are wealthy and paying for good legal teams.

But where's your evidence that the woman has hired a PR company to handle the media?

I think the article was saying "epilepsy" so I was talking/thinking about this particular diagnosis, not any random seizure. Internet is still saying epilepsy is being diagnosed mostly before 20 or after 60.

And yet there are people on this very thread stating their own, or their relatives, sudden onset in their 20s, 30s and 40s. So whilst it's possible most cases may happen at those ages, clearly it's no where near all.

All parties involved were likely wealthy. It happened in a wealthy area at an independent school. All will have the finances to pay for the best legal teams they can.

What a horrible and ignorant comment. It is a medical fact that people who have suffered a seizure frequently remember nothing about it. Whether or not someone has had a seizure can be seen from brain scans.

Would you have preferred it if the driver had not said she was sorry?

"The head teachers aren’t happy." So what? They don’t get to dictate how the police or the CPS do their work. No-one is going to have shared the evidence or all the driver's medical information with them. I understand that they feel terrible about it, and feel they are on the side of their pupils' families, but they should butt out.

Sometimes dreadful accidents happen. Not everything bad that happens is someone else's fault. That’s why it’s called an accident.

A lot of the unpleasant comments on here seem to be based on reverse snobbery.

Well if she'd been playing golf she clearly must be guilty.
Most golfists are psychopathic child killers. It,'s a provable fact; like all the others on this thread.

This is true. If people are going to make the argument that having money means the driver could've paid off the police, CPS or whoever provided the medical evidence, presumably they also think the Met could've been paid off to review the investigation.

How jolly convenient that the driver ''has no memory at all'' of the deaths.

My friend has no memory of his seizure and my dh clambering over him to bring the car to a stop so no one or no thing was hurt, damaged or worse.
That's not convenient. It's fairly normal in such a situation.

DD's friend who has fairly regular seizures never has any memory of the event. This is despite the fact she tends to come round quickly and can continue with her day following them.

It surprises me that people are so quick to lay blame and intent, and state things that are quickly cleared up by a mere Google search!

Having no memory of a seizure event is fairly normal.

My word
As others are saying the speculation here is terrible
Tragic accidents do happen. I am thinking of the coach crash with the school children on the wirral where I live. A heartbreaking outcome for the families of the children who died but again an accident, the driver seemed to have heart issues and also sadly died.
I think cases need to be reviewed and lessons learnt. But this persecution and online speculation is horrendous

Yes. Why waste all that money on investigations when we can just ask Linda from Mumsnet whether something doesn't sit right with them about it.

People have leant nothing from the Nicola Bulley case.

Or the ongoing Jay Slater case. Or the Madeleine McCann case. Or really any other high profile case over the past 20 years where some randomer whose legal/investigation knowledge is based on watching 24 Hours in Police Custody thinks they know more and could do a better job than professionally trained people with 20 years' work experience.

See also: I don't vaccinate my children/believe in homeopathy/think the earth is flat because I have "done my research" online.

Idiots.

Edit. Wrong thread!

Lots of people who want to shut down discussion on this thread.

The families are entitled to feel as they feel and to raise their concerns with the investigation.