A BRIDGWATER man who suffered life-changing injuries in a what he calls a road rage incident has said his attacker’s 14-month jail sentence is too lenient.

Peter Cox, 54, says he was deliberately knocked down and reversed over by John Crowley following a dispute over a parking space in Weston.

Mr Cox, of Saltlands, suffered a crushed lung, extensive shoulder injuries, broken fingers and a broken hand in the incident on November 30.

He spent four months in hospital, had his spleen removed and still requires physiotherapy.

Crowley, 44, admitted to causing serious injury by dangerous driving and dangerous driving at Bristol Crown Court on Friday.

Speaking to The Mercury afterwards, Mr Cox said: “I just feel that justice hasn’t been done.

“He knocked me down deliberately and I was reversed over. I felt the car go back and forward over me three or four times.”

Mr Cox explained how, as he stood in a parking space to save it for his son, Crowley approached in his Mercedes and told him to move.

After a brief exchange Mr Cox says Crowley, formerly of Spring Hill, Weston, then drove into him, knocking him down.

Burnham and Highbridge Weekly News:

MR Cox spent four months in hospital.

 

In court, prosecutor James Ward claimed the incident escalated when Peter Cox’s son Craig intervened, and became involved in a fracas with Crowley in the car.

Mr Ward said: “Mr Crowley’s car stopped. Peter Cox was on the ground, under the front wheels of the Mercedes.

“The car reversed back, but Mr Cox’s son saw what happened. He came over to the Mercedes with a woman and they confronted Crowley in the car.

“Crowley drove the car whilst being attacked.

“The car goes over Cox. The car reverses, which was the defendant trying to get away or it was caused by his flailing around in the car and it reverses back over Mr Cox again.

“Mr Cox is under the car and the wheels are spinning. Eventually it spits Mr Cox out of the back of the vehicle into the gutter.”

The court heard that Crowley emerged from the fracas with Mr Cox junior with a chunk of his nose missing.

Peter Cox told the Mercury: “If Craig hadn’t done what he’d done I would have died - I have no doubt about that.”

He is unlikely to make a full recovery and says the incident has affected him mentally as well as physically.

“I’m still in huge amounts of pain and need physio once a week,” he said.

“I’ll need further surgery on my shoulder and my left hand won’t close properly. “I can’t even lift my own grandson up for a cuddle.

“The sentence is disgracefulinconsidering the injuries I suffered. “I feel like he should have been charged with attempted murder or GBH at least.”

Sentencing, Judge Picton said: “It is understandable that he (Mr Cox) and his family will regard all those injuries as being the responsibility of this defendant, but the sentence I have to impose cannot be predicated on that basis.

“There came a stage whereby the severe nature of the attack to which the defendant was subject meant that he stopped being criminally responsible for the movement of the car.

“He was at that stage converted from engaging in criminally bad driving into someone possessed of the status of a victim.”

Crowley was also banned from driving for three years.