I've seen some strange stories in my time but this one takes the biscuit. [url]http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/kent/7263515.stm
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Air crash passenger was prisoner
A passenger in a light aircraft which crash-landed in a garden in Kent was a prisoner on day release from jail.
The prisoner, believed to be serving a sentence locally for importing drugs, suffered minor injuries when the Cessna 172 crashed in Lyminge on Saturday.
The pilot, Sid Clark, said he assumed the prisoner was out "legitimately".
A statement from the Ministry of Justice said the prisoner had been returned to "closed conditions" while an investigation was being carried out.
The aircraft crashed shortly after taking off from Rochester Airport and both men were taken to the William Harvey Hospital in Ashford for treatment.
The prisoner, who was within the last two years of completing an eight-year sentence, was then taken to Maidstone prison.
Mr Clark, from Maidstone, who also received minor injuries in the crash, told BBC Radio Kent the flight was logged with air traffic control at Rochester as a one-hour trip.
'Flew over roof'
He said the plan was to fly to Dover, then turn back but he did not get that far.
"I didn't see anything until a second before the impact," he said.
"We flew over the roof of the house, which I thought was a ploughed field."
Recovery teams removed the aircraft from the garden on Monday and lifted it on to a lorry to be returned to the Medway airfield.
Cynthia Reid, owner of the aircraft, which was hired to the pilot and passenger, went to the scene on Monday and said she was "heartbroken".
She said: "It was my pride and joy I'm afraid - it's just one of those things.
"Accidents happen and after 10 years it's gone."
Eileen Watling, the owner of the house where the plane landed, said: "We've had a very lucky escape."
She said if the aircraft had not hit the tree, it would have landed on top of her home.
The two injured men walked through the trees and into her conservatory after the crash landing, she added.
"One had cut his head and was bleeding profusely, and he'd got a bruised eye.
"The other one was just shocked, but he was covered in aviation fuel."
She said the pair were released from hospital that evening, "so they were lucky".
The Air Accidents Investigation Branch has been informed - it is not yet known why the aircraft came down.
Kent Police have searched the crash scene but found nothing suspicious.
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