AN EDENBRIDGE woman's worst nightmares came true when she was shot dead by police.

Ann Sanderson had written about having dreams of being killed by officers in her diary just days before she was killed in June 2007, it was revealed this week.

But her former lover has denied she wanted to "end it all".

The revelations came at the long-awaited inquest into the death of Miss Sanderson, who was known to friends as "Tosh".

The 37-year-old made history when she became the first woman in the UK to be killed by police following a stand-off behind M&Co in Sevenoaks High Street.

The inquest heard that Tosh, who at the time was living in Bethel Road, Sevenoaks, had a troubled life.

Her mother had died when she was just nine and she was raped at the age of 15.

She had periodically self-harmed and suffered bouts of severe depression, particularly in May and June, around the anniversary of her mother's death.

Growing up, she had been in trouble with police for crimes including arson, criminal damage and carrying an offensive weapon.

Her partner, Tracey Sumner, said Tosh had done this for attention.

On Monday the jury was shown CCTV footage of the moments leading up to Tosh's death.

She was seen brandishing what was believed to be a handgun in the town centre in the early hours of June 11, 2007.

She pointed the weapon at CCTV cameras several times, set fire to one industrial bin and attempted to set light to another, watched from Sevenoaks District Council's control room by CCTV operative Patricia Parcelle, who contacted police.

She told the court: "I'd watched her for several years now and I'd never seen her like this. She definitely pointed what appeared to be a handgun at the camera."

When asked by Paul Bowen, representing Edenbridge resident Ms Sumner, what she thought Tosh was doing, Ms Sumner said: "She was not able to control those feelings that had been brought back to her and she needed to get to a safe place again.

"The way she had done that was to attract the attention of police, get herself arrested and be looked after in prison where it was safe."

Housing association officer Ms Sumner first met Tosh, who had recently been released from prison, in July 1999.

She had been re-homed in a property for which Ms Sumner was responsible. She was given the job of gardener and the pair became friends.

Tosh, who had kept a journal called My Thoughts, My Feelings, My Fears since her teenage years, had written in it that she planned to ask Ms Sumner to marry her.

Extracts of the diary were read out by Mr Bowen.

Ms Sumner told the inquest that Tosh, who grew up in Edenbridge, suffered from insomnia and would go out walking late at night, but believed that she was constantly being watched by CCTV.

Ms Sumner said: "Tosh, from when I first knew her, believed that the CCTV cameras in the town of Sevenoaks and Edenbridge, or where she was at the time, would follow her and the CCTV operators would make a point of following her.

"She found this particularly intrusive."

On the night Tosh was killed, Insp Mick Millen said in a conversation heard on the CCTV: "I know she has said, in the past, she would kill a police officer."

But no written evidence was produced at the inquest to support this.

Ms Sumner told Mr Bowen: "That's nothing she had ever said to me, or I had ever been aware of."

Earlier Ms Sumner had admitted that Tosh had not liked the police.

When Tanya Robinson came to quiz Ms Sumner on behalf of Kent Police, she asked if she had difficulty the idea Tosh might have wanted to "end it all" that night.

"That isn't what she would have done," replied Ms Sumner.

But she did accept Tosh had kept things from her, including the fact she bought an air pistol on June 3.

Tosh had been cornered by armed police at around 2.40am in the car park behind M&Co.

After a brief stand-off she was shot and died from a single gunshot to the chest.

She was pronounced dead at 3.10am.

A toxicology report found alcohol and Nurofen in her bloodstream.

The inquest continues