WHEN you do my job you like to think you've seen and heard it all.

Working on the news desk of a daily paper, you discover all manner of things - some of them weird; some of them unusual; some of them dreadfully sad; or hilariously funny; occasionally shocking.

This week we carried a story that did just that - it shocked me.

Court reporting can be one of the biggest eye openers when you're a trainee reporter.

But it's usually the depravity of the crime or the grotesque details of another human's actions that leave you speechless. This week it was the sentence.

At Worcester Crown Court, this week, Deirdre Smart was jailed for nine months for killing a man.

On the surface of it, that sentence may sound a little lenient.

But the more I think about this crime, the harsher I find the sentence.

Mrs Smart is a 56-year-old widow from Droitwich who was driving a car that hit a man on a country road, sadly the man died.

According to the evidence she wasn't speeding, she wasn't drunk, and she wasn't on the phone. The crime didn't even fall into the 'dangerous' driving category.

But because the road was clear, the weather fine and the car mechanically sound, it was deemed that Mrs Smart should have seen the man - Barry Embling - in plenty of time to stop, and she pleaded guilty to a charge of careless driving.

Mrs Smart's defence offered no explanation for her mistake, other than it was a lapse of concentration.

She had, they said, vowed to never drive again.

Perhaps, if it had been a relative or friend of mine who was crossing the road that day I would feel differently, but I like to think not.

Because the truth is that none of us are perfect drivers. We have all suffered a lapse in concentration.

There are literally hundreds of things that can distract us - the radio, a phone call, spotting a familiar face, spotting a pair of nice boots on a passer-by, lighting a cigarette, taking a slurp of coffee, biting into a juicy apple, the stresses of life, sneezing, a fly in the car, the list goes on and on - and yet we all drive around perfectly safely 99 per cent of the time.

My points is that when Mrs Smart set out on her weekly trip to the supermarket, she had no intention of hurting anyone and believe me the courts are packed full of people that do.

Every day people who hurt others on purpose are let free, and yet Mrs Smart was not.

Today instead of carrying on with her life as volunteer with Shelter and the Salvation Army she is waking up in a prison cell, and I can't help but feel that that is somehow wrong.