Liz’s £ 2,000 triumph over Amazon – after one of its vans runs down her dog
LIZ Hurley’s beloved pet labrador nearly died after being run over by an Amazon van delivery driver, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
The actress was ‘devastated’ after two-year-old Hector suffered a collapsed lung and a broken leg in the accident on a private road on her Herefordshire estate, Donnington Hall.
Amazon initially refused to take responsibility, but has now agreed to pay the £2,000 vet bill, nine months after the accident.
Last night the star’s sister Katie Hurley – who was on the estate when Hector was run over last December – told the MoS: ‘Elizabeth was absolutely devastated. She had organised for the walker to take him out with two of our other dogs, and then the next I heard was Hector howling. He had staggered back to the house. He collapsed and was bleeding in my arms.
‘We thought we were going to lose him, it was just hideous. The vet came and thankfully saved his life, which is miraculous. We nearly lost him because of this man’s appalling driving.
‘The van was driving too fast. Because it happened on the estate a speed limit can’t be enforced so we ask people to use their common sense, but he didn’t.’
Ironically, earlier this month Amazon launched a competition to find the Face of Amazon Pets.
‘Amazon clearly thought we’d give up and go away,’ said Katie. ‘All we ever sought were the vet’s bills. But they kept trying to deny it was their fault and tried to blame it on the driver not being an employee of theirs. So last week I was forced to threaten legal action and they then agreed, pretty quickly, to pay the bill.’
Last night, Miss Hurley said: ‘[Amazon] have finally settled the bill and it has taken them nine months to do so. That’s all I can say about it.’ Amazon said the van involved was contracted but insisted the matter would be ‘resolved to the satisfaction of the customer’.
In March, Miss Hurley was left distraught after Katie’s son Miles, 21, was stabbed in London.