Janoušek tells court he ran over woman accidentally

The trial has begun in Prague of influential businessman Roman Janoušek, who faces charges of attempted murder for allegedly running over a woman last year while in a state of inebriation. He later fled the scene. On Tuesday morning, Mr. Janoušek read a statement to the court asserting that he had not seen the woman and had hit her accidentally. He said that the incident had occurred at a time when the media were carrying transcriptions of wiretaps of his conversations with former Prague mayor Pavel Bém and that this had made him agitated. The wealthy businessman requested that the rest of the trial take place in his absence and refused to answer questions from the court or the state attorney.