PETTS WOOD: Fatal crash accused gives tearful testimony (From News Shopper)

PETTS WOOD: Fatal crash accused gives tearful testimony

1:55pm Thursday 10th September 2009 in News By Robert Fisk

A TEENAGER accused of causing a fatal crash in Petts Wood sobbed in court today as the prosecution accused her of lying.

The 17-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was travelling in a Mini Cooper when it swerved and hit a tree before crashing into a wall in Southborough Lane.

She was sitting on the lap of another passenger on the car’s front passenger seat and is accused of grabbing the steering wheel just before the collision.

The car driver, 21-year-old Lee Waite, died at the scene in the early hours of February 10 last year.

Mr Waite, of Narrow Way, Bromley Common, had been driving six of his friends back from a petrol station after buying cigarettes and alcohol when the crash happened.

Yesterday the court heard how the girl had played in the driving seat of the Mini while the car was at the petrol station.

But Sarah Whitehouse, prosecuting, told the girl this story was a lie to explain why her fingerprints might have been on the steering wheel.

Mrs Whitehouse said: “[You were] playing with the wheel for five minutes and the steering wheel did not lock?

“That’s something you made up at the police station.”

When asked why one of her friends and Richard Rutter would have told the police she yanked the steering wheel, the defendant said they had lied.

She said: “She [her friend] was so infatuated with Lee.

“I do not understand why she’s lied.

“I know I never touched that steering wheel. I know I never.

“[Richard] doesn’t know me.

“I have been going through 19 months of this and people telling me I killed someone I didn’t kill.”

The defendant told the court she had urinated behind cars with the other girls while they waiting to go to the petrol station.

Mrs Whitehouse, prosecuting, said she only did this because she was very drunk.

But the teenager disputed this.

When questioned by her defence Christopher Whitehouse she said she was scared of the speed Mr Waite was driving the vehicle.

He was driving the car "like a bicycle" the court heard.

The teenager said: “I can remember Lee’s feet and they looked like he was riding a bicycle.

“His feet were both just going up and down, up and down [on the pedals].

“I can remember he was wearing black Converses.

“That’s the last thing I remember [before the crash].”

In the crash she sustained several injuries including a broken arm.

She was interviewed at Bromley police station on April 10 last year where she was charged with manslaughter.

The case continues.