A grandmother was killed in front of her partner after police chased a speeding Audi driver who drove into an Amazon delivery van.

Kathleen Kirby, 66, was hit by the van as she walked along the pavement with partner of 20 years.

Police had begun a high-speed pursuit of Chad Rimmington in Wigan. Driving an Audi TT, Rimmington, who never passed a driving test, reached 78mph in a 30mph zone before crashing into the back of a van being driven by an innocent Amazon delivery driver.

The collision caused the Amazon driver to spin and mount the pavement, hitting Ms Kirby.

She was killed, and Rimmington, 32, who was branded a ‘f**king scumbag’, admitted causing death by dangerous driving.

Her partner, Cliff Bullen said he had been ‘inches away’ from being killed himself as they walked home together following a visit to a local nature reserve.

In an emotional statement to the court he said: ‘Sometimes, when I’m alone at night and reliving the nightmare over and over again, I wish I had been [killed too].’

Rimmington, who said he was planning on killing himself that day after the death of his partner, will be sentenced on Thursday.

Prosecuting, Colin Buckle told how Rimmington was driving on Bickershaw Lane at about 2.30pm on Monday, June 26, when he caught the attention of officers due to the speed he was travelling at. They ordered him to pull over but he failed to respond, and police began a pursuit.

He then drove on the wrong side of the carriageway and reached more than double the 30mph speed limit, at one stage reaching 78mph.

Rimmington drove through two red lights and at one point was ‘inches away’ from hitting another pedestrian, Mr Buckle said.

He continued onto Lily Lane and then Bolton Road, an area where there are several schools, when Rimmington ‘slammed on the brakes’ causing police to hit the Audi. Unfazed, Rimmington sped off and the pursuit continued.

The Amazon driver was turning onto Bolton Road when Rimmington drove onto the wrong side of the road to overtake other cars. ‘It’s plain that he just couldn’t have seen the Audi coming,’ Mr Buckle said of the Amazon driver.

Rimmington crashed into the back of the Amazon van, causing the vehicle to lose control and spin onto the pavement where Ms Kirby was walking with Mr Bullen. She was left unconscious as Mr Bullen and a police officer made desperate attempts to save her.

But she was pronounced dead at 4.11pm that afternoon. Rimmington was ‘pulled from’ the Audi and a Taser was pointed at him before he was arrested.

‘I’ve killed someone, I’m so sorry,’ he told an officer. ‘I deserve to die.’ As distressing CCTV footage was played in court of the horror crash, one of Ms Kirby’s loved ones was heard to call Rimmington a ‘f****** scumbag’.

Rimmington sat in the dock with his head in his hands as it was played, as Ms Kirby’s loved ones wept. The court heard that tests revealed Rimmington was over the legal drug driving limit for cocaine at the time.

Defending, Paul Treble said: ‘There is no doubt there was cocaine in his system, he had been using it.’ He said that Rimmington’s partner had taken her own life a few days earlier and that he was in a ‘world of grief’.

They had met while they were both drug addicts living on the streets, and had begun a relationship and helped each other, Mr Treble said. She suffered from mental health problems and Rimmington struggled to find help for her, the court heard.

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Following her death, Rimmington ‘relapsed into his old ways’ and ‘took an awful lot of drugs’, Mr Treble said. He said Rimmington did not want sympathy from Ms Kirby’s family.

‘He is sorry for what he has done, he deeply regrets what he has done.’ Judge Nick Clarke KC adjourned sentencing until tomorrow morning.

He told Ms Kirby’s family: ‘I understand that no sentence I can impose can ever diminish your suffering.’

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