The parents of a girl killed when a Land Rover ploughed into her school have said they live in “horror” because of how long the police case is taking.
Nuria Sajjad and fellow eight-year-old pupil Selena Lau died after the crash at The Study Prep school in Wimbledon, south-west London, on July 6 last year.
Several others were injured when the car crashed through a fence and collided with a building.
A woman arrested on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving was released under investigation.
Her mother Smera Chohan said: “Occasions have come and gone in the last 10 months from Christmas to new year to Ramadan to Eid to Mother’s Day to her ninth birthday.
“And we have lived through all of those without knowing how or why our daughter was killed.
“This is how much time has passed. This is unacceptable and it’s a horror that we live in.”
Nuria’s father Sajjad Butt said: “The only reason for this delay in this coming to the next stage is a lack of specialised resources to deliver a particular part of the investigation.”
Mr Butt added that the case might be “impacted” because as time passes “memories fade”.
He went on: “Asking critical people to wait nine months for things to move, could this impact us getting justice for our girl? It might.”
The families want cases involving child fatalities to be prioritised and greater resources given to these investigations.
Earlier this month, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley wrote to Trevor Sterling, the solicitor representing the families, detailing how investigators have spoken to 150 witnesses, analysed CCTV and forensically examined the car.
A decision over whether the driver will be charged is expected at the end of this month.
Sir Mark said the force investigates around 100 fatal collisions per year and that these are taken in turn.
“I fully understand your representations that child victims of road deaths should be prioritised and I recognise the devastating impact that the death of a child has on their family.
“Our current approach is that all fatal collision investigations are progressed in the order that they begin to ensure we are able to answer the questions the friends and family have as quickly as possible.
“Any decision to prioritise one case would result in another family waiting longer for answers.”
There is only one six-year, part-time course available to train forensic collision investigators which means there are very few people qualified to progress these police inquiries, Sir Mark wrote.
In an open letter to London Mayor Sadiq Khan, Mr Sterling said a lack of resources is slowing down police investigations into road deaths.
Mr Sterling said in a statement to the PA news agency: “There are a number of issues here, the lack of forensic examiners, the time it’s taking for them to prepare reports, the time it takes forensic examiners to be trained; all of this has a huge impact.
“Delay is the enemy of justice. These processes need to be expedited, especially in cases of public interest where children have died and this is what we want the mayor to hear from us on this.”
