Driver who killed man in grass cutting row jailed

A driver who ran down and killed a man during a grass cutting dispute has been jailed for nine years.

Mark Wigley, 60, hit 45-year-old Liam Green in a VW Touareg on Rose Tree Avenue in Cudworth, near Barnsley, at about 17:00 BST on 3 April.

Following a trial at Sheffield Crown Court, he was cleared of murder but convicted of manslaughter, while his daughter, Sarah Wigley, 39, and brother-in-law, Neil Shaw, 54, were cleared of all charges.

At a hearing earlier, Judge Graham Reeds KC told Wigley, of Royston Road, Cudworth: "It is a case where you used your car as a weapon and intended to hit him and cause some injury."

The dispute started after Green went knocking on doors offering to cut people's grass and came to the house of Mark Wigley's mother.

She became upset that Green had offered her the service for a £7.50 fee and sent images from her Ring doorbell camera to her family, who believed she was being harassed.

The court previously heard that Green had struggled with addiction.

The trio found Green after about 30 minutes, with Shaw driving a Ford Ranger to the scene, while Mark Wigley was driving the VW and Sarah was his passenger.

Judge Reeds said: "It is a mark of the breathtaking arrogance of you and your daughter, and the family members who referred to him in derogatory terms, that you collectively made no inquiry into why he was calling at pensioners' bungalows and just assumed that he was a drug user who was pestering older people for money.

"He was not, but that didn't stop you."

Joe Stone KC, for Wigley, said his client had asked his daughter Sarah to call 999 immediately after the incident, did not attempt to flee and did not drive over Green after the initial collision.

He said: "This is an accident that has happened almost spontaneously and has had devastating consequences for multiple parties."

Stone said there had been three witnesses who described Wigley's "shock and surprise".

"This is not a man who has just no previous convictions, he is someone with a whole raft of witnesses behind him that can testify to the type of man he is," he said.

"He has led an honest and industrious life to date."

In addition to his prison sentence, Wigley will be banned from driving for five years after his release.

The judge told him: "Liam Green's mother accepts that her son was no angel, but one thing the evidence in this case clearly demonstrated is that, regardless of what he might have done in his past, on this occasion he was doing nothing more than going to neighbours on the estate where his mum lived and trying to get work cutting the grass."

Laurie Hilton, Green's mother, spoke through tears about her son who "had only wanted to help neighbours with their garden".

She said that following his death, she struggled to go to the shops and could no longer eat chocolate or cheese, and onion on toast because it reminded her too much of him.

"I miss his phone calls of a night and I would say a big hug from mam and he would say a big hug from Liam," she said.

"He was a real mammy's boy."

Hilton added: "I will never see him again until I join him.

"Sometimes I pray for that day to come sooner. I am so miserable."

Shane Green, his brother, wrote in a statement that the impact on his family had been "unimaginable", while Green's ex-partner, Sally Wilkinson, with whom he had a son, described him as "a good man with a big heart and lots of love to give".

Listen to highlights from South Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North