A woman who drove into a mother walking with children after a school gate punch-up has been tagged and banned from driving.
Kristi Morton, 31, reversed into Danielle Smith and knocked her down after a feud between the mothers turned to violence outside the school. Morton went before a jury on a charge of endangering her rival’s life, but was found guilty of a lesser charge of driving dangerously and hitting Ms Smith.
Sheriff Jennifer Bain KC said: “You behaved in an aggressive manner towards Danielle Smith instead of removing yourself from the situation. The location was a road where children were being collected from school, straight after school. There was a reasonable amount of traffic and people walking children home from school.”
Morton, Dalwhamie Street, Kinross, stormed out of court after being placed on a curfew for three months and banned from driving for 12 months. The jury heard how Ms Smith was flattened when she was struck with the open passenger door of the Audi being driven by Morton on 24 August 2022.
Jurors were told the two mothers had been involved in a long-running feud and had clashed violently in Green Park, Kinross, a short time earlier on the same date.
Ms Smith told the trial she had to wriggle out of her jacket while Morton pulled the hood off, and said: “She was just going off her head – pure arms flailing about. She just wanted to fight with me.”
Morton said that she was the one who was assaulted and she told jurors she was left with her face “gushing with blood.” The jury found the allegation that Morton had assaulted Ms Smith at this location not proven.
At about 3pm, Ms Smith was walking down Station Road with another mother who had collected her child from nursery. She said Morton’s white Audi cut across the road towards them and she could hear someone within the car shouting.
“They were just trying to get a rise out of us,” she said. “She was just wanting a fight, the same way she was earlier.”
Ms Smith said she and her friend and the children walked on, but then heard “a loud revving sound. I’m guessing I was hit by the car door because it totally wiped me out,” she told the jury. “It struck my lower back and put me completely to the floor.”
The court was told that the victim suffered scrapes and bruises, with scars on her knees and hip. Her iPhone was smashed and clothes damaged.
She added: “It was a year to the day that my brother was killed in a car accident, so it was very traumatic for me.”
In her evidence, Morton claimed Ms Smith had opened the car door as they drove past and tried to get inside and punch her. Morton was charged by police with assaulting Ms Smith to her injury, permanent disfigurement and to the danger of her life, but the jury found that charge not proven.
They instead found her guilty of an alternative charge of driving dangerously by accelerating and then reversing at speed, colliding with Ms Smith. Morton’s front seat passenger, best friend Shannon McGurk, 27, was also accused of the same charge of assaulting Ms Smith to the danger of her life. She was found not guilty midway through the trial. Mother-of-three Morton wept in the dock as the jury delivered its verdict.
As well as the dangerous driving charge, she was found guilty of behaving in a threatening or abusive manner, likely to cause fear or alarm, by challenging Ms Smith to a fight and acting in an aggressive manner towards her. She was further found guilty of breaching bail conditions by approaching Ms Smith at Giacopazzi’s store on 6 April 2023.
Solicitor David Holmes, defending, said: “She was driving at that place to collect a child. She realises she has done wrong. She should have checked the door was closed before she drove. In her evidence she said she had an injury to her face after being attacked by Danielle Smith. She had a facial injury and felt under threat.
“She tried to reverse to get out of there. The car was stopped relatively quickly. At that moment she was faced with the dilemma of what to do.”
Fiscal depute Alistair McDermid said: “I understand her position is that the accused was punched by the complainer 15 minutes or so before the driving took place. Evidence was given by at least three witnesses that nothing was obstructing her from driving forwards instead of reversing. No defence of necessity was at play.”
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