It took just seven seconds for Diana Morgan-Hill’s life to change forever.
One moment she was a glamorous, international businesswoman boarding a train following a day’s work at her own company. The next, she was lying underneath the train, having been pulled underneath when it moved off.
Just five days after the horrific accident, which saw Diana lose both her legs, she learned from the front page of the Evening Standard that British Rail was to prosecute her for “trespassing” on its tracks.
What followed was a five-year High Court battle, which Diana says was more traumatic than the accident itself, in which she attempted to clear her name.
Diana, who lives in Poole, has now written a book about her attempts to secure justice and it’s a harrowing read.
She was conscious throughout the accident and can recall every single moment of the horror, which took place nearly 25 years ago in August 1990.
“I had my own business called Media Vision, doing press and PR mainly for the international TV business industry,” says Diana, now 54.
“It involved a lot of travel, going to Cannes, Monte Carlo, LA, New York. It was full-on and fantastic. I had a very nice flat in Bromley, it was a two-train journey to get to our office.”
To all intents and purposes, it was a day like any other when Diana arrived at Wandsworth Common station.
“I wasn’t in a particular rush, but knew that I would have had to wait for a good half an hour, 45 minutes,” she remembers.
“I had done that journey 100 times before. It was rolling stock. I stood on the running board and the train moved off at speed, jolted away.
“I had a heavy bag on my shoulder and it pulled me round. My right leg fell into the well. My chest was against the platform, the train was on my back, but I was fine.
“I screamed, but it was almost an embarrassed scream, and yelled ‘stop the train’. The train did not stop.”
As the train moved along, Diana, who broke nearly every one of her ribs in the initial crush, fell into the gap between two carriages, when a wheel caught her right leg and pulled it off, pulling her underneath the train with it.
“The train still carried on,” she says, “I ended up face down. The left leg was hit by two massive bolts of electricity – 650 volts, twice.”
Diana, who had moved 120ft underneath the train, was stuck for 35 minutes because of the angle she was at, before it was decided to switch the electricity back on and move the vehicle.
She was taken to St George’s Hospital in London for a life-saving operation. Her left leg was amputated above the knee, her right just below.
Just five days later British Rail issued a devastating press release.
“It was front page news of the Evening Standard,” remembers Diana, “‘Legless woman to be prosecuted by British Rail’.
“They were going to prosecute me for breaking a 100-year-old bylaw by trespassing on their tracks. They were going to fine me £50.
“I was deeply angry and deeply saddened.”
British Rail claimed Diana had tried to board a moving train. She remains adamant it was stationary.
The first High Court case took place in February 1992.
“They stuck to their guns that the train was moving,” says Diana, who had since had her daughter, Lara, and got married.
“They claimed because I wore contact lenses that my peripheral vision was not very good. But the really cruel part of the whole thing was them judging how much I was worth as a person.”
The first settlement Diana was offered, following three years of negotiations, was an electric wheelchair and some walking sticks.
She eventually received £630,000 from British Rail, five years after the accident, after a judge decreed the firm was 70 per cent responsible.
Diana then enjoyed spending time at home with her daughter, before she and her husband, whom she has since divorced, set up a small company writing press releases for the city, and she also did some TV work.
She began writing a book as a form of therapy, but friends urged her to get it published. The death of her father, and her divorce, meant it was several years before the book was finished, but it is now completed.
“I’m now very proud of the fact that I’ve been able to write this,” says Diana, who remains in and out of hospital with “management” issues.
“I don’t know anybody else that’s been so horribly awake and able to relive every single moment, and then had a big authority go on the attack after you when you’ve so vulnerable and weak.”
But Diana was determined not to let her experiences rule her life.
She took part in the BBC’s Dancing on Wheels, and even performed at the 2012 Paralympic Games opening ceremony.
Diana moved to Poole the same year. She is regularly invited to give inspirational talks and is now concentrating on writing a novel on domestic terrorism.
“I haven’t been on a train since,” she admits.
“I went on a very brief journey about five years ago and it was absolutely terrible. It was the smell of the diesel.
“But it’s something that I’m determined to do. The emotional advice was that I must get on with my life.
“I’m doing my utmost.”
- Love and Justice, by Diana Morgan-Hill, is available from Amazon, Waterstones, and blackbird-books.com
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