Woman hit by traffic cone seeks leniency for accused

A GALWAY student who suffered horrific injuries when she was hit by a traffic cone thrown from a bridge in Edinburgh has asked a judge not to jail the Australian man responsible.

Andrew Smith, 30, yesterday admitted hurling the cone 40ft from the George IV Bridge after a drunken night out in the Scottish city centre last November.

It hit university student Kate Flannery, 24, who was chatting to friends outside a pub, leaving her with a smashed skull and three fractured vertebrae in her spine.