Woman on Trial for Beatrix Potter School Gate Incident
Accused of dangerous driving after hitting a group of children and parents
Openview outside Beatrix Potter School. Picture: Google Streetview
A 39-year-old woman from Wandsworth is currently on trial for dangerous driving after an incident outside Beatrix Potter Primary School in Earlsfield.
Dolly Rincon-Aguilar, 39, is accused of mounting the pavement in her Toyota Rav4 and hitting pupils and parents who were waiting outside the school on Openview on 8 September 2020.
Eleven people had to be treated for injuries including four adults and five children, some as young as six, who were taken to hospital. A seven-year-old boy was thrown in the air after being hit by the car. Some of the children received serious bone fractures and one required emergency surgery to remove a blood clot.
A tree and wall were also hit during the incident which occurred as children were being collected after school.
Ms Rincon-Aguilar, appearing at Kingston Crown Court, has denied eight charges of causing serious injury by dangerous driving. She claims that she lost control of the car after going numb and says that she has no recollection of pressing the accelerator.
She was insured to drive and had not taken drugs or alcohol and was collecting two of her own children from the school.
CCTV footage captured the incident which lasted for 8 seconds and shows the car travelling 35 metres before colliding with the wall.
The court heard statements from eyewitnesses how they had heard an engine revving and then saw the car travelling at speed before there was a loud noise as it hit a boy with his back to the vehicle which he ended up underneath along with other people who had been in the group that bore the brunt of the collision.
The prosecution is not alleging that Ms Rincon-Aguilar intended to cause harm but that she was responsible for ‘a seriously bad piece of driving’.
The trial continues.
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July 26, 2022