OAP, 82, faces court after being hurt in crash with police car (From Dorset Echo)

OAP, 82, faces court after being hurt in crash with police car

7:30am Monday 7th December 2009 in

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AN 82-YEAR-OLD woman who was injured in a crash with a police car with its sirens on is facing prosecution.

Joan Tatler, of Langton Herring, near Weymouth, will appear at court later this month to face a charge of driving without due care and attention.

Mrs Tatler, 82, said she is frightened of appearing in court and of the sentence she could be handed.

She said: “I’m quite concerned as I’m quite nervous at the best of times and I get very tongue-tied. I feel very stressed over this.

“I’m not sleeping well and I tremble every time I think about it. I have never been involved with the law in this respect, or in any respect, and to come at this time in my life, it’s a bit frightening.”

Mrs Tatler suffered a dislocated knee, a gash to her other leg and bruising in the collision on the B3157 coast road between Weymouth and Bridport on March 18 this year.

She was driving her Rover Metro home from the doctors’ surgery in Portesham when the crash with the marked BMW police car occurred at the junction to Langton Herring.

The emergency services cut her out of her car and took her to Dorset County Hospital in Dorchester, where she stayed for three days.

Mrs Tatler’s leg has taken seven months to heal and she said she is still feeling unsteady on her feet.

She said: “It’s also about the hassle of going to court as I’m a bit wobbly since the accident and I have lost confidence in my legs.

“I’m worried about going to court because you get questions fired at you, or I presume you do from what I have seen on television. I’m hoping the solicitor might be able to take a lot of it off my hands.”

The pensioner, who retired to the village 20 years ago after working as a warden at an elderly care complex in Portesham, said at the time it was the first serious crash she had ever had.

Now Mrs Tatler is worried that she will lose her licence and is urging any witnesses to the crash to come forward.

Mrs Tatler has had support from her three sons, David and Stephen Banner, who both live away, and Robert Banner, who will be attending court with his mother.

A spokesman for Dorset Police confirmed that Mrs Tatler had been summoned to appear before Blandford Magistrates Court for driving without due care and attention.

He added: “The inquiry was initially referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission but they declined to supervise, obviously they did not feel it was necessary.”

Mrs Tatler is due to appear before Blandford Magistrates Court on December 23 at 10am.

The leader of group that fights for the rights of pensioners condemned the move as ‘appalling’.

Grahame Leon-Smith, who heads the Senior Citizens Party, was among those to raise concerns.

He said: “I think it is appalling that it should come to court.

“Somebody should have had a quiet word and left the matter to the insurance companies to sort out.”

He added: “I think the case should be dropped. Perhaps she should see what action she can take against the police.”

Nigel Coles, who is co-ordinator for Weymouth’s Age Concern, said he didn’t know the circumstances of the case but that in some similar previous cases the police and Crown Prosecution Service had taken a sympathetic view in the past.

District councillor Thomas Barrett, who represents the Chesil Bank ward including Langton Herring, said he was unaware of the full details of the case.

But he added: “I do feel very sorry for Mrs Tatler because this is going to be a distressing thing for her to go through at that age, or at any age for that matter.”

The landlord of the village’s Elm Tree pub, Andy Dewell, said Mrs Tatler’s son often went into his pub for a meal when in the area.

Mr Dewell added: “It’s probably not right to prosecute a woman of this age, although I don’t know her personally.”

Other Langton Herring locals have pointed out that the stretch of the B3157 on which Mrs Tatler was in collision with the police car is in their view ‘dangerous’.

Chesil Bank parish councillor Sheila Milton said the turning for the village is at ‘quite a difficult angle’ while local resident Julie Barrett described the junction as ‘rotten’.

A spokesman for Age Concern declined to comment on the specifics of Mrs Tatler’s case but added: “There is a perception that older drivers are less safe than younger drivers.

“Statistically, however, the figures show that older drivers are safer than younger ones and cause fewer accidents.

“Older drivers on the whole are much safer than younger drivers.”