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Family's anguish over hit and run mystery
A family have made a last-ditch public appeal for help in solving a mysterious incident that left their elderly father with crippling injuries.
Relatives of dementia sufferer Stanley Sudworth believe he may have been involved in a hit and run accident involving a bus.
But because of his illness the 79-year-old cannot remember what happened and almost a year to the day since he was left with multiple leg fractures, police have drawn a complete blank.
From the rumours and second-hand reports they have been given, the former miner's family believe that he was struck by a bus near to the Queen's Theatre on Wigan Road, Ashton, the vehicle crushing his feet and legs against the kerb and railings before throwing him over the railings where he suffered a head injury.
Incredibly no-on called an ambulance and it is thought the badly-injured Mr Sudworth was accompanied on a bus to his home in Harlech Street where a neighbour saw him being helped into the house by a man.
It was only the following morning when his daughter Andrea went to see him and found him unable to get up and still with dried blood on his head, that the alarm was raised.
Andrea today appealed for both the good Samaritan and any witnesses to the incident – which happened at around 2pm on Thursday July 10 last year – to contact the police.
She said: "My dad suffered four fractures to one leg and three to the other and he spent several months in hospital. Because he is very confused he has not been able to tell us what happened to him that day.
It is an absolute miracle that he managed to get home in the first place given the nature and seriousness of his injuries.
"We keep hearing Chinese whispers about what happened. It's always something like 'I've been talking to someone who knows someone who said that he was hit by one of those shuttle buses just outside the bus station' but no actual witnesses with first-hand accounts have come forward.
"We reported the matter to the police but they too have been unable to get to the bottom of it. Yet this happened in Ashton town centre in the middle of a busy afternoon. Someone must have seen something and he must have been bleeding as well. Perhaps this story will jog someone's memory."
A police spokesman said: "We investigated an incident in which an elderly gentleman was seriously injured, it having been alleged that he was hit by a bus.
"We spoke to the relevant bus company – HTL Merseyside – and they had no record of a road accident having taken place.
"The inquiry has so far not got to the bottom of what happened but we would very much welcome anyone with information to get in touch."
Those with details should ring the Wigan road policing unit on (0161) 856 7201.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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