A FORMER nurse yesterday admitted her inattention as she turned her massive horsebox off a Perthshire road caused the death of a Blairgowrie man.

The family of RNLI engineer David McKenzie (50) wept in court as they heard how his motorbike smashed into the 71/2-tonne lorry driven across his path by 54-year-old Joanne Chinn of Little Keithick, Coupar Angus.

Chinn had denied careless driving since the crash on August 27 and had been due to stand trial yesterday.

But she changed her plea at the last moment, admitting she caused the accident.

She was banned from driving for two years and fined £480.

The court heard how Chinn, a recently-retired nurse and Macmillan nurse of 30 years, was travelling north along the A93 Perth to Blairgowrie road when she made her fateful decision to turn right into a minor road at Cargill.

After stopping to let traffic pass her on the opposite carriageway she began to turn straight into the path of Mr McKenzie’s motor-bike.

Depute fiscal Lucy Keane said, “She indicated to turn right and came to a stop at the junction and, having checked the road, proceeded to execute a right-hand turn across the roadway.

“Just seconds into that manoeuvre Mrs Chinn became aware of a flash in front of her and this was a motorcycle being driven by Mr McKenzie coming in the opposite direction and it collided with the front offside of Mrs Chinn’s horsebox.”

She said Mr McKenzie was driving at the speed limit and added, “There was insufficient time for him to take action to avoid the collision.

“Persons interviewed, who were within vehicles behind Mrs Chinn as she was waiting, did inform the police they saw the motorcycle approaching so it seems she ought to have seen him approaching.

“She perhaps did not pay sufficient attention to oncoming traffic and did not notice the motorcycle approaching in the other direction and that’s the basis on which the Crown deems she was driving carelessly.”

Despite Chinn and other motorists rushing to help— and the emergency services arriving within minutes—Mr McKenzie died at the scene.

Chinn’s solicitor Mike Tavendale expressed his client’s “very deep regret and remorse” over the death.

“This has been a tragic accident and Mrs Chinn has accepted her culpability.”

He said she had been momentarily distracted as she checked whether anything was approaching the junction along the minor road and had not checked to her left again before beginning to cross.

Stressing that witnesses had told police she was driving in a “perfectly proper manner” before the accident, he said Chinn had checked the road before crossing but it would have taken a longer-than-normal time for the horse box to move off.

Mr Tavendale said accident analysis had shown Mr McKenzie would only have been able to see the horsebox for a distance of 80 metres after rounding a bend in the road and would have had less than three seconds to react.

Why he did not appear to witnesses to do so, he said, was a mystery.

He added, “What Mrs Chinn has to accept is that, having commenced the turn, she should not only have been paying attention to the junction into which she was turning but also keeping a lookout to her left and her only conclusion is she did not do so.

“The piece of driving is one which would be at the lower end of the scale (of careless driving), albeit the circumstances were particularly tragic.”

He asked that Chinn be allowed to keep her driving licence to help her sick daughter keep her business running.

Sheriff Linda Smith pointed out the charge to which Chinn pleaded guilty is not punishable with a custodial sentence and that she had to examine the standard of driving rather than its ultimate effect.

“No sentence I can impose today can reflect the tragic loss of life or the consequences for those who knew him,” she said.

Mr McKenzie’s widow Wendy (42) said afterwards, “It was a fair sentence. The woman has to live her life with what happened.

“It has been horrendous living with this because the case has been moved so many times. I’m just really glad it’s over.”

Mr McKenzie had been an RNLI employee for 13 years, rising to the role of deputy divisional engineer for Scotland.

Divisional inspector for the RNLI in Scotland John Caldwell said, “Dave was a first-class engineer, well respected and very much liked.

“He had a ‘can do’ attitude to everything. He was part of a very close-knit team at the RNLI in Perth and had the full confidence of every lifeboat crew.”