Bus driver 'dragged student half a mile thinking he had hit bottle'
A bus driver hit a Cambridge University medical student and dragged her more than half a mile under his vehicle, thinking he had only run over a bottle and a fox, a court heard.
Miss Tan, who was about to start her third year of a medical degree at Cambridge’s Peterhouse College, landed at Gatwick Airport just before midnight on September 29 2010
By Sam Marsden
3:28PM BST 12 Jun 2012
Mingwei Tan, 20, had just returned from holiday when she was knocked down and killed by a double-decker bus.
The driver, Shahriar Firouzian, 52, told police he did not realise he had struck Miss Tan, and even stopped to pick up a passenger while the student was trapped under the vehicle, a jury was told.
He recalled running over a bottle and a fox on the road, which corresponded to the points at which the pedestrian was hit by and then eventually dislodged from the bus, the prosecution alleged.
Miss Tan, who was about to start her third year of a medical degree at Cambridge’s Peterhouse College, landed at Gatwick Airport just before midnight on September 29 2010 after a holiday with friends in Cyprus, London’s Blackfriars Crown Court heard.
The Singapore-born student took the N24 night bus to Hampstead, north London, where she planned to pick up more luggage from a family friend’s house before catching a 6am flight to Rome.
But as she crossed Pond Street outside Hampstead's Royal Free Hospital at just after 1.45am on September 30 she was hit by an N5 night bus with Firouzian at the wheel.
The bus continued for about 930 yards before the student’s body came free. Her wallet and mobile phone were found in the road near Belsize Park Tube station, nearly a mile from where she was first hit.
Paramedics tried desperately to save Miss Tan, who was president of Cambridge University’s karate club, but she was pronounced dead at the scene.
Hamish Reid, prosecuting, said Firouzian “totally failed” to see the student as he turned into Pond Street.
He told the jury: “I don't suggest for a moment that as Mr Firouzian started his shift he intended to kill Miss Tan. Of course he did not. Whatever your decision in this case he will have to live with this for the rest of his life.”
But he suggested that as an experienced driver, Firouzian should have checked his blind spots, particularly outside the entrance to the hospital’s A&E department.
When he was arrested, Firouzian told police in a prepared statement: "It was a perfectly normal journey so far as I was aware. I think night bus drivers drive over objects in the road, I try to avoid cats, foxes, rubbish bags and bottles.
"I think there was a bottle left behind the hospital when I picked up an old black lady. A bit later I think there was a fox just after Belsize Park train station."
Mike Money, a friend of Miss Tan’s from Cambridge, said she did not know London well and questioned air hostesses on the flight from Cyprus about how to cross the capital to get to Stansted Airport for her journey to Rome.
The engineering student said in a statement read to the court: “She was asking staff on the plane about buses and things because she didn't know how to get around after the Tubes had closed."
Iranian-born Firouzian, of Watford, Herts, who had worked for bus company Metroline since 2003, denies causing death by careless driving.
The trial continues.
