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Mum and son guilty of ramming driver out of revenge

Peter WalkerEssex
Stuart Woodward/BBC Hollie Dance is wearing a black coat, is clutching a phone, and has blonde hair. She is looking down to the ground. She is walking towards the camera. Another person is standing behind her, out of focus, and behind that is the glass frontage of Southend Crown Court.Stuart Woodward/BBC
Hollie Dance - pictured at an earlier hearing at Southend Crown Court in November 2024 - will be sentenced at a later date

A 50-year-old woman and her son have been convicted after ramming a driver into a tree in what prosecutors described as a revenge attack.

Hollie Dance and Thomas Summers chased the victim for 13 miles (21km) on roads in south Essex on 10 October 2022.

Dance claimed the man had attacked her daughter in Westcliff-on-Sea earlier that day.

At Basildon Crown Court, jurors found Dance and 25-year-old Summers, both of Southend-on-Sea, guilty of causing grievous bodily harm with intent.

While giving evidence during the trial, Dance was emotional when she explained the incident took place three weeks after she buried her son Archie Battersbee.

The 12-year-old's life support was switched off in August 2022 after a legal battle that attracted global attention.

'Increasingly frantic'

Prosecutor Richard Scott claimed the trio drove to find the victim in Meteor Road in Westcliff at about 20:45 BST.

He said Dance "stalked" the victim in her BMW along the A127 westbound, with Summers following in a rented Toyota.

The victim made an "increasingly frantic" call to police, Scott said, before he was rammed into the tree in Uppermayne in Basildon by Dance.

Summers mowed him down as he tried to escape on foot, the court heard.

In her defence, Dance said she "wanted to identify the person who attacked my daughter".

"I followed him, but I accept that it wasn't the right thing to do," she said.

Stuart Woodward/BBC Basildon Crown Court is a large glass-fronted building with blue cladding and blue window trims. There is a sign in the foreground which says "Crown and County Courts", and there is a grass verge between the sign and the court building.Stuart Woodward/BBC
The trial was mostly heard at Basildon Crown Court

Dance was also found guilty of possessing a liquid gas device, after police found an incapacitant spray with her DNA on it at the scene.

She had already pleaded guilty to dangerous driving.

Summers, who like his mother lived in Alton Gardens in Southend, was additionally found guilty of affray. He had already admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving.

Jurors decided he was not guilty of possessing an offensive weapon, in the form of a baseball bat.

A second man, 25-year-old Rhys Bentley, of Norwich Avenue in Southend, was in the Toyota with Summers.

Bentley was found not guilty of causing grievous bodily harm with intent, causing serious injury by dangerous driving and affray.

Jurors took about three hours to deliver their unanimous verdicts.

Sentencing will take place at a later date.

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