Lillie Edwards sat on Ouse Bridge in York for eight hours

Police cordoned off Ouse Bridge for eight hours on June 14 last year because Lillie Edwards, 28, was sitting on it and wouldn’t move. The closure included the entire morning rush hour.

Huge traffic queues built up on surrounding roads, businesses within the cordon, which covered streets leading to the bridge, were unable to open and people couldn’t get to work or the shops.

Queues in Skeldergate during the Ouse Bridge closure (Image: Newsquest)

York Magistrates' Court heard that at least 30 police officers had to be deployed, as well as ambulance staff, firefighters and York Rescue Boat during the incident which started at 3am and only ended after 10am when Edwards agreed to leave the bridge.

She told the court she remembered nothing between arriving in York by train and finding herself in an ambulance with police in attendance.

“I feel bad the road was closed but I don’t remember,” she said.

READ MORE: How we covered the incident at the time

Deputy district judge Nicholas Hayles decided after hearing evidence that Edwards had been aware of what she was doing and was reckless as to the consequences of her actions on others.

He convicted her of recklessly causing a public nuisance and wasting police time. Edwards, of Somerset Road, Norton, Stockton-on-Tees, had denied both charges.

She has three previous convictions for similar matters and magistrates in Greater Manchester had put her on a community order following her conviction for a similar offence last year.

After hearing from probation that she was making very good progress on the community order, the judge gave her a 12-month conditional discharge and ordered her to pay a £26 statutory surcharge.

Edwards told the court a visit from her mother, about whom she made allegations, had triggered a “dissociative behaviour” episode shortly before she arrived in York.

She said she had had similar episodes and that afterwards she remembered nothing of what she had done during them.

The cordon at the Skeldergate end of Ouse Bridge (Image: Newsquest)

Prosecuting, Natalie Dean said at 3am on June 14, 2023, a member of the public alerted the police to Edwards sitting on Ouse Bridge. She didn’t move and all three emergency services and York Rescue Boat were called out to deal with the situation.

She remained on the bridge until 10.42am when she made her way off it to the waiting emergency services and told them she had taken an overdose.

Part of Clifford Street was closed off (Image: Staff)

Police took her to York Hospital, where she was in a distressed state, and later to Foss Park psychiatric hospital where a doctor assessed her that afternoon and said she didn’t have an acute mental illness at the time, and could be emotionally dysregulated.

She did not speak to police and communicated with them using an iPad or text messages.

In evidence, Edwards said she had been in intensive care a week after the incident and was then sectioned under the Mental Health Act. She had been assessed since June 2024 for autism and other mental conditions.

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