Two young women were killed and a third was critically injured after a speeding car ploughed into them as they walked home from a night out.
Emma Harold aged just 26, along with her sister, Beccy and friend Kate Wasyluk, aged 25, were walking along Foxhall Road, Ipswich, when a car veered off the road hitting all three girls, then crashed into a brick wall.
An off-duty nurse who happened to be passing by at the time of the tragic accident, desperately tried to revive Miss Harold and Miss Wasyluk, but was unable to save them. The three girls had been out to a soul night at a their local social club and were walking home at 12.15am on Saturday 22 February 2009, when they were hit by the silver Citroen Saxo.
72-year-old Janet Pearse called the emergency services after being woken by the sound of a car smashing into her garden wall. She said: “The damage that I have had to my house does not in any way compare with what happened to those poor girls. I have never seen so many police. It was horrendous.” Her son Dave added: “The car hit the women and the wall so hard that bricks were hurled against her house, leaving gouge marks on the brickwork. It was just a horrendous scene. A woman was dead in her garden and another had been thrown next door. The car landed up a short distance down the road but its engine was ripped out and lying on the other side of the road. Wreckage was strewn everywhere.”
The force of the collision was so immense that it threw all the women into nearby gardens and knocked down a 30ft wall. Police were forced to close the road for over nine hours as they carried out investigations.
Claire Bracket, who had been with the girls earlier that night, said: “They were so full of fun and taking pictures of one another and had obviously had a goodnight.”
Another neighbour Dr Helen Bright aged 54, said: “This off duty nurse told me how she tried to help the women but they were so seriously hurt that she stood no chance of saving them.” She added that she had written to her council previously asking for a 20mph speed limit to be set for the residential road. “I complained to the council several months ago about the speed that the cars go down here. The road is empty and quiet at night and it is very easy to speed”, she said.
Paramedics fought to revive the women at the scene but the two most seriously injured were pronounced dead on arrival at Ipswich Hospital. Beccy Harold was taken to the same hospital with multiple injuries and was described as being in a stable condition.
A 20-year-old man and a 22-year-old woman were arrested on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving. They both initially denied driving the car but it has been confirmed by police that it was the man who was driving the car at the time of the accident. He was kept under police guard in hospital on the night of the accident as doctors treated him for a fractured collarbone. The woman was treated for minor injuries and was released the same day. They have both been bailed by police until 18 March.