‘My whole world was shattered in a single moment’
WOMAN RELIVES HEARTBREAK OF FINDING OUT HER HUSBAND HAD DIED IN CRASH
A WOMAN has recounted the heartbreaking moment she learned that her husband had been killed in a crash.
Driving back from work, Cathryn Wilcox had heard about a fatal collision on the radio – then saw a police car parked outside the family home.
Her husband of 13 years Ian Wilcox was fatally injured in a head-on two-car crash on Tonge Moor Road on Thursday, August 7, this year – leaving behind Cathryn and their two daughters.
Mrs Wilcox was speaking during a hearing at Bolton Crown Court, where the driver of the oncoming vehicle in the crash, Violeta Taraskevic, admitted causing death by careless driving while under the influence of alcohol.
Taraskevic, 34, of Brierwood, Bolton, was driving a BMW 530 when she hit Mr Wilcox’s Chevrolet Matiz at around 5.15am on August 7.
Mrs Wilcox said she was driving home after a night shift when she heard the report about the crash.
“I remember pulling into our close and a police car was waiting outside”, she said, reading her victim impact statement to the court. Officers then told her what had happened.
“My world was shattered in a single moment. My first thought was how on earth would I tell our girls their daddy had died. Our family, our team broken.
“I felt frightened to see them and look at them as I was about to break their hearts.”
Taraskevic, a mental health support worker, wept in the dock as Mrs Wilcox described how her family’s ‘hopes and dreams had been taken cruelly away.’
The court heard how Taraskevic had been working late in the evening and then drank two bottles of cider at a friend’s house, before getting behind the wheel of her husband’s BMW 530.
David Lees, prosecuting, said a witness estimated the BMW was travelling at 40 to 50 miles per hour shortly before the BMW veered across Tonge Moor Road into Mr Wilcox’s path.
Taraskevic stopped and waited with Mr Wilcox until ambulance arrived. He died in Salford Royal hospital.
Defending, Sara Haque, said the defendant was in “a state of panic and shock at the scene.”
When she was breathalysed almost three hours later, Taraskevic was found to have 68 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath – almost twice the legal limit.
She denied causing his death by dangerous driving but admitted causing death by careless driving while under the influence of alcohol at Bolton Crown Court yesterday.
The case was adjourned to allow an expert to calculate more accurately the defendant’s alcohol levels at the time of the crash. Sentencing will be on October 4.