An elderly woman has collapsed and died after giving evidence in the trial of a police constable accused of causing the deaths of a middle-aged couple by dangerous driving.

The trial of Andrew Baynes was immediately adjourned when Frances Mitchell, 83, took ill within minutes of leaving the witness box at Aberdeen Sheriff Court. She died later in hospital.

Ms Mitchell had just given evidence in the trial of PC Baynes who denies driving dangerously, at excessive speed and causing the accident which led to the deaths of Sydney and Christine Carey.

Earlier, the jury heard about the final moments before a middle-aged couple were knocked down and killed by a police car in the city.

Sydney and Christine Carey died after the vehicle driven by Grampian Police Constable Andrew Baynes crashed into them in November 1998.

The policeman was on his way to an armed robbery when he clipped a parked vehicle, mounted the pavement and pinned the couple to the wall of a granite tenement.

Car 'between bollards'

Mr Carey, 56, and his wife Christine, 61, suffered extensive injuries.

Isabel Anderson, 79, told the jury that she was almost crushed in the accident as well.

She said: "I had gone down to the shops and was walking home. There was the sound of sirens.

"I turned and saw two police cars and out of the corner of my eye I saw a couple."

Ms Anderson said she watched cars go by her and a minute later she heard another siren.

"I hesitated and looked back again. I saw the car coming up between the bollards and the island towards the bend.

'I heard an awful noise'

"Just as it got to the bend something happened and the car suddenly shot sideways right across the road and onto the pavement.

"I stepped back until my back was right against the wall. At the time the couple were quite near me."

Breaking down she added: "The car just came up and swept the couple away. I turned my head and heard an awful noise at my shoulder. Something just slumped at my feet.

"When I opened my eyes I saw part of the man's body in front of me."

Mr Carey, a former oil worker, bore the brunt of the impact with the Vauxhall Omega driven by Pc Baynes.

His wife, a retired school teacher originally from Shetland, was taken to hospital but nothing could be done to save her.

The trial before Sheriff Principal Douglas Risk continues.