The driver in the Wimbledon school accident won't be charged?

[RiverF]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cw4448xx4keo

It sounds like a unavoidable and unforeseeable medical incident led to the tragedy, but the families wanted justice.

I can't begin to imagine their pain, but this is the right decision?

This.

The poor woman has her own life sentence through no fault of her own. No way for her to predict a seizure when it was a first occurrence.

Heartbreaking fir all involved and affected. She will probably never stop feeling guilt about thos even though it wasn't something she could control.

I have epilepsy and even when I did manage to go one year clear a few years back I won't drive because I live in terror of something like this happening. It only takes one short absense seizure never mind a full blown grand mal.

Absolutely devastating. I doubt she will ever drive again after this.

RIP beautiful girls 💐

You can't make medical evidence appear out of nowhere though.

Well you could, but would a KC and medical professionals risk their own careers to fake evidence?

No it would be absolutely awful to live with although I didn't think her statement sounded particularly sorry. But in the same way, you can also see why the parents FEEL like they should be able to see the evidence (presumably medical).

But presumably she could have been witnessed convulsing in the moments after the crash even before ambulances turned up?

To keep their wife (and mother of their children?) out of prison? Of course they would. I'm not saying that they did, of course, but I'm sure some would, if they deemed it necessary.

The more likely thing here is that the expensive legal and medical team has been able to produce evidence that might not have been available to a more ordinary defence.

Even if she wasn’t in the midst of a seizure it may have been pretty evident that she was in a postictal state. Symptoms can vary and yes there can be other causes but if she had no head injury then symptoms may have pointed to that.

When I was at school, about 14 or 15 I think, a girl in my form suddenly had her first epileptic fit. I can remember the shock but she subsequently had several before they got her meds sorted and then it seemed under control. As I remember it, over 50 years ago, we were all sitting round chatting at break time, she was sitting on a desk and suddenly there was a bang and she was on the floor. By the time a teacher came the worst of the fit was over. I can well imagine if that happened when you were driving anything could happen.

Oh gosh, it doesn't work that simplistically – it's not about faking medical evidence, but about opportunistically leveraging on the foundation of evidence. I won't repeat it, but there's a nickname within the profession for those doomed to legal aid/public defense – very much not the case here. There's a reason people pay for top tier defense, even if it means mortgaging their vacation villas.

@Scruffily if that happened you would most definitely have seen witnesses being quoted at the time.

Do we know anyone put forward "reams of arguments and private medical evidence"? I'm sure the driver would have been checked by her own doctor, and the police would have had access to the result of those checks, but obviously they made their own checks.

My poor DS has seizures

He never had them until he was in his mid teens.

Having a medical incident like this with no prior warning could have happened to anyone including the deceased children's parents.

Exactly this. It's not an episode of Law & Order or Grey's Anatomy, all tied up in a neat bow at the end of the hour and everyone moves on with their lives. These things take time, sometimes for medical reasons and sometimes just because the people doing the investigating are investigating a million other things too and this is just one case on their overcrowded desk.

The woman had a medical event behind the wheel, it's more common than you might think, I know an older man who had a stroke behind the wheel and killed someone. Devastating for her devastating for the families but that doesn't mean anyone was at fault. Sometimes tragedies just happen.

Would you? If you were, say, a teacher who had seen this, would you necessarily run to the nearest reporter? Bear in mind that there are issues around publicising private medical evidence, and that the police would have told witnesses not to go to the press.

It can depend how long a seizure lasts for an individual - with my brother we don't call an ambulance unless he is still going after ten minutes. Some people can have much longer seizures than others - obviously he is quite an extreme case, but we do not know (and have no right to know) any details about the type of seizure this lady had. Ten minutes - the paramedics would have seen evidence.

There is also video telemetry used to assess some epilepsy, my brother has had two week long stays in King's ten years apart for this so that his type of seizures can be assessed and the drugs tailored accordingly.

What is your medical speciality?

This sort of speculation/conspiracy theorising helps no one

As to the car - any car of a decent size would have been a problem

Are pp suggesting that we all drive Fiat 500s?

It was a horrible, tragic accident

Why not go the whole hog and say the school should have had a stronger wall around it?

I remember at the time some (now deleted) posts on twitter saying that she had a seizure and had bitten through her tongue. So sounds like there were witnesses who saw seizure like symptoms.

I am surprised there was only a fence, ive never see a state school with anything less than metal railings.

I do also think those cars are unnecessary, even an estate the kids might have been thrown above the bonnet. So sad all around

Guess you've had a Re*n truck up your exhaust pipe too?

There's a world of inbetween though and that particular vehicle is a tank, even compared to other SUVs

He's not a KC. It's not hard to find out who he is.

Agreed. These SUVs are a threat to pedestrians and cyclists. She was driving a tank.

Non-insane automatism, you don't get it very often - it can also be something as seemingly minor as a sneezing fit, a spasm, sudden attack of severe vertigo, you're not in control of what your body is doing. Hypo/hyperglycaemia is another classic one. But to make it a valid defence you can't have caused the condition yourself or knowingly placed yourself in a dangerous situation - so if you know you're diabetic and haven't been taking your medication properly and haven't eaten, you've caused the situation where you lose control. That's why you also can't get blind drunk or take illegal drugs and then use that as an excuse for committing a crime. If there is no evidence you had any reason to think you were unsafe to drive due to a neurological condition, then it's outside of your control. This will end up being an example cited in all next year's A Level law exams!

Because the girls families are not fully convinced.