Teenager fears she'll go BLIND after taxi hit by wanted man in Sheffield police chase

Jerri Mather was returning home from a shopping trip with her boyfriend and another friend when a driver fleeing police smashed into the side of the taxi they were using on Abbeydale Road yesterday, Wednesday, July 22, at around 4.30pm.

The 19-year-old, who already had impaired vision, says her eyesight has deteriorated since the crash and she is terrified that she may lose her sight completely.

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She told how she is still in shock after the crash, which has left her in horrendous pain, with whiplash and a nasty bump to her head.

“I took the brunt of the impact and I’m in so much pain. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like this before,” she told The Star.

"I’m already noticing the deterioration in my vision, which is really blurry. This has left me struggling to read the keyboard on my phone, which is usually pretty clear, and I could potentially go blind from the pressure.

"I just remember sitting in the taxi when suddenly everything stopped, I heard my boyfriend go ‘oh ****, no’, the pain hit me and I realised we’d been in a crash.

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"I saw police pinning someone to the ground as I was getting into the ambulance.

“It’s lucky it wasn’t more serious and no one was killed, because there were lots of people around. The guy who did this is an absolute idiot.

"We’re lucky it happened right next to a doctors’ practice and all the medics came out to help.

“We're all still in shock and we can’t believe what happened."

Jenni was taken to A&E at Northern General Hospital, where she said she spent six hours, and she is due to attend the Royal Hallamshire Hospital today to have her eyes checked.

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She said her boyfriend, Nicky Lee, also 19, and their friend had also sustained whiplash, though they did not require hospital treatment on the day, and the taxi driver, who had only recently undergone an operation, also attended A&E but is not believed to have been seriously injured.

Jerri had been heading home to Sharrow following a trip to Tesco on Abbeydale Road when the taxi was hit.

A wanted man, aged 21, was arrested following the chase, which had started in Derbyshire.

South Yorkshire Police said officers began pursuing the black Ford Mondeo, which was stolen in Derbyshire, as it headed towards Sheffield on the A621 Sheffield Road.

It collided on Abbeydale Road with the taxi, a police car and the pharmacy before coming to a stop.

The wanted man was arrested on suspicion of two counts of burglary, three counts of robbery, failing to stop and two counts of dangerous driving.

Anyone with information is asked to call police on 101, quoting incident number 326 of July 22.