Fairground Workers Sentenced Over Death of 7-Year-Old Girl in Bouncy Castle Accident

Summer Grant, a 7-year-old living in Essex, England, died in March 2017 when an inflatable bouncy castle became untethered, flew 300 feet and smashed into a tree with her inside.

Fairground workers and couple, William Thurston, 29 and his wife Shelby Thurston, 26, were both found guilty of gross negligence on Thursday and sentenced to three years in prison.

Summer's father, Lee Grant, gave a statement following the ruling to The Sun.

"When Summer died, I felt as if I died too. I felt as if I had nothing left to live for because she was my beautiful angle," Grant said.

"I would have been selfish and taken my own life just to be with her," he added, crediting his family for convincing him not to take his own life.

The judge who sentenced to couple, Justice Garnham, said at the end of the trial that the two "took the most monumental risk with children's lives by continuing to allow children on the bouncy castle. ...And that risk-taking cost Summer her life."

The Thurstons were self-employed at the funfair Summer was at in Harlow Park, Essex.

"On hearing the evidence in this case, it strikes me as extraordinary in the 21st century that it should be common place in the fairground industry, as the evidence I have heard suggests it is, that inflatable play equipment should be operated and open to the public without the operators using proper wind speed measuring devices," Garnham continued. ""I would urge the Health and Safety Executive to take the steps necessary to make their use compulsory at fairgrounds to prevent another tragedy like that of Summer Grant."

The couple was found guilty of a health and safety offense, each earning another 12 months in prison that would run concurrently.

The Sun reports a yellow weather warning signaling potentially dangerous winds was in effect when Summer was in the castle at the time. Winds reportedly reached 40 miles per hour in the area, and jurors were told the Thurstons failed to properly keep the inflatable castle anchored.

The castle was described as "cartwheeling" as it flew and bounced through the air.

"I never thought that my Summer playing and having fun on the bouncy castle would end her young life," the girl's mother Cara Blackie said during the trial in a statement to the prosecution attorney.