Prosecution insists M20 crash death not suicide
Pensioner was due to start cognitive therapy for anxiety
A pensioner was killed after her car collided with the back of a lorry parked illegally on the hard shoulder of a motorway slip road, a court heard.
Susan Mellor, of Sherbourne Drive, Maidstone, was wearing her nightclothes when she ploughed into the Mercedes articulated truck in the early hours.
But although the 74-year-old mother was having anxiety issues it was not thought she was on a suicide mission, Maidstone Crown Court was told.
Czech lorry driver Jaroslav Horvath denies causing death by dangerous driving and an alternative charge of causing death by careless driving.
He had arrived on a ferry at Dover in December 2015. He told police he felt tired and unwell and wanted to rest after a rough crossing.
Horvath, 40, said he could not find anywhere to park and drove off the M20 at junction seven near Detling, looking for somewhere to stop.
He went down a slip road towards London, and stopped behind three other lorries parked illegally on the hard shoulder.
“The location is lit by street lighting,” said prosecutor Simon Connolly. “It was completely on the hard shoulder, so it was not blocking either of the two lanes.”
Horvath went to sleep in the cab.
Jurors were shown CCTV footage of Mrs Mellor’s Nissan Qashqai heading for the lorry and then disappearing just after 5am. She died instantly, and Horvath was woken by the collision.
Mr Connolly said vehicles were not allowed to park on motorways because it was inherently dangerous. The hard shoulder was intended to be a place of refuge.
The jury was told Mrs Mellor had made plans for the future and had a grandchild on the way.
Mr Connolly said her house was, for her, untidy, and she would not have wanted anyone seeing her in her night clothes.
He added: “The evidence suggests she did not set off with the idea of committing suicide.”
She was due to undergo cognitive behaviour therapy the following week, having sought help with problems from her GP.
No mechanical difficulties were found with her car.
The trial continues. Fant Farm has been saved after a planning inspector rejected Gleeson Homes’ appeal over an application for the site.
Maidstone Borough Council refused permission for the developer to build 225 homes on fields off Gatland Lane, Barming, last March.
An appeal followed, but Tuesday planning inspector Olivia Spencer threw it out due to the effect on the character and appearance of the area, highway safety and local transport infrastructure.
She also considered the council’s housing supply and planning policy in her decision.
Gareth Owen, chairman of Save Fant Farm, said: “This is a wonderful relief. We were backed by the residents of the area and felt we had to fight for them, and now our efforts have been vindicated.
“Fant Farm is going to be green fields for a bit longer. This is absolutely wonderful news. We had no money to employ specialists or barristers, and we had no particular experience. All we had was passion and belief.”
Helen Grant, MP for Maidstone and the Weald, said: “I am absolutely delighted with the inspector’s decision. This has been a very long battle, one that has been murmuring in one form or another ever since I first came to Maidstone almost 10 years ago. Let this be a message to developers: they will not have it all their own way in Maidstone.”