He will soon know his fate. The motorist who injured more than 100 people by driving into the crowd in May during Liverpool FC football club’s English Premier League victory parade will be sentenced following a two-day hearing on Monday and Tuesday.
Paul Doyle, 54, was arrested at the scene and taken into custody. Judge Andrew Menary warned at the end of November that it was “inevitable” that he would receive a heavy sentence and called on him to “prepare” for it.
This father of three teenagers, who was in tears during previous hearings, faces life imprisonment. After initially pleading not guilty, he admitted to deliberately driving into the crowd, but gave no explanation for his actions. The terrorist trail was ruled out very early on.
134 people were injured, including a six-month-old baby
On May 26, hundreds of thousands of supporters, often with their families, gathered in the city center of Liverpool, in the north of England, to applaud the club’s players, including stars Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk, who had paraded in a double-decker bus.
But the scenes of joy gave way to chaos when Paul Doyle crashed into the crowd with his car. Earlier, he had left his family home in a Liverpool suburb in his Ford Galaxy Titanium to pick up a friend who was taking part in the celebrations. The streets were closed to traffic but, according to the investigation, Paul Doyle had rushed behind an ambulance.
This crazy race had lasted seven minutes. In total, 134 people were injured, among whom around fifty had to be hospitalized, according to the police. The youngest victim was a six-month-old baby who was thrown from his stroller, but miraculously escaped without serious injury.
Images on social media showed bodies on the ground, a man thrown onto the hood. Victims found themselves trapped under the vehicle. “It’s only luck that no one was killed,” said police inspector John Fitzgerald at the end of November. Many are still recovering from the injuries they suffered that day. »
“It’s only luck that no one was killed”
A man finally managed to get into the car and put the automatic transmission in park, thus helping to immobilize it.
In an unexpected turnaround, Paul Doyle admitted on November 26, in a barely audible voice, to the 31 charges against him – including that of attempting to cause grievous bodily harm -, which automatically ended his trial.
He thus admitted to having “deliberately driven into a crowd of innocent people,” prosecutor Sarah Hammond said at the time. A camera in his car showed he was “increasingly agitated because of the crowd.” “Rather than wait for her to pass, he deliberately rushed at her, forcing his way through,” continued the prosecutor.
Paul Doyle was a former Royal Navy soldier according to British media, who worked in cybersecurity. The prosecution had planned to present videos at the trial from his car showing him repeatedly swearing and honking at pedestrians, angered by their presence on the roadway.
“Driving a vehicle into a crowd is a deliberate act of violence. It was not a simple moment of confusion on the part of Paul Doyle,” added the prosecutor.
After the arrest of Paul Doyle, the police quickly ruled out the terrorist trail. She received hundreds of videos from supporters at the scene to help her investigate.
