Diana said "Oh My God" as she lay dying: witness

LONDON (Reuters) - Princess Diana said "Oh my God, Oh my God" as she lay dying in the wreckage of a Paris car crash, a witness told the jury probing her death on Thursday.

Volunteer firefighter Damian Dalby, speaking to the London inquest by videolink from the French capital, said he ran towards the crashed Mercedes in a bid to help.

"There was smoke emanating from the vehicle," he said.

A photographer was standing next to the car's rear door but "he did not stop me from doing my assistance job," Dalby said.

Dalby, who did not realize at the time that the woman was Princess Diana, told jurors that she said: "Oh my God, Oh my God."

Diana, 36, her lover Dodi al-Fayed, 42, and driver Henri Paul died in the early hours of August 31, 1997 after their speeding limousine crashed into a pillar in a road tunnel as they sped away from the Ritz Hotel, pursued by paparazzi.

Dodi's father Mohamed claims their deaths were carried out by British secret agents on the orders of Queen Elizabeth's husband, Prince Philip, because Diana was pregnant and the couple were about to announce their engagement.

Major investigations by French and British police have concluded the deaths were an accident caused by an inebriated Paul driving too fast, but under British law an official inquest is needed when someone dies unnaturally.

Another witness told the jury of his conspiracy theory that paparazzi lured her car into the Paris tunnel so they could take photos of her with her lover.

Jacques Morel, who is writing a book about his conspiracy theory, said there had been a plot by photographers to bring Diana's car to a halt in the tunnel so that they could obtain an exclusive story.

Morel, also speaking by videolink, said he saw paparazzi waiting for the Mercedes at the entrance to the tunnel before the crash and that French photographer James Andanson was behind the plot.

He said his theory was also based on evidence from a secret "explosive and corrosive file" he had seen, but which he said he could not produce at the inquest.

"The conspiracy theory in your book is that the photographers were going to lure the car into the tunnel so that they could take photographs. That is right, isn't it?" Richard Horwell, the police's lawyer, asked him.

"Before the TV channels, yes," he replied. "It was not for pictures. It was for the scoop."

Horwell said Morel's motivation was to sell as many books as he could.

"The truth is, Mr. Morel, that you will write and say anything to make money, won't you?" Horwell said. "I suggest, Mr. Morel, you have no interest in the truth whatsoever."

Later the court heard statements from other witnesses who reported seeing paparazzi swarming around the crash scene.

"One of them was shouting," Audrey Lemaigre said. "At one stage he actually said 'she's alive, she's alive'."

Sebastien Masseron, who had been with Lemaigre, said: "I heard one photographer call over to a colleague who was on a scooter at the exit to the tunnel, and say: 'Come back, come back, she's alive'."