Diana driver’s guilt over fatal crash
PRINCESS Diana’s driver Colin Tebbutt yesterday admitted he felt guilty at not being there for her and blamed chauffeur Henri Paul for the Paris crash in which she died.
Mr Tebbutt, a former police inspector and royal protection officer who worked as the Princess’s driver for the last two years of her life, said Mr Paul had driven too fast into the Alma tunnel before smashing into a concrete pillar in the accident on August 31, 1997.
In a rare television interview to mark the 20th anniversary of Diana’s death, he told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “I didn’t drive at high speed. We didn’t.”
He suggested Mr Paul, who was three times over the French drink-drive limit according to toxicology reports, may have been confused by the concrete pillars.
“There are stanchions in the tunnel,” he said. “You go in too fast where there are stanchions it’s getting a little bit worrying.”
Asked if he felt responsible for not driving that night, he replied: “Always.” Describing the “very emotional day” he was sent to Paris to recover Diana’s body from hospital a few hours after she had died, he said: “It was very difficult and emotional to see someone laying on a bed, not a mortuary.”
One of her most trusted aides, Mr Tebbutt described Diana as happy in the final year of her life after her divorce and that she was a good employer.
He added that the Princess had a tremendous sense of humour. “I never had a cross word in two years,” he said.