£575 fine and ban for death-crash joyrider is a joke, says family

Published on Monday 11 August 2008 22:04

THE family of a teenager killed in a car crash voiced anger yesterday after the "bored" joyrider who was driving was allowed to walk free from court.

Jason Ness, 17, died after his friend Philip Tod, 21, lost control of the stolen car while trying to negotiate a bend at high speed.

Tod, who had never sat a driving test, was found guilty of causing the crash that killed his friend, when the car flew 150ft into a field.

He was banned from driving for six months and fined 575 yesterday by Sheriff Linda Smith at Perth Sheriff Court.

Rena Ness, the victim's grandmother, said: "He took a young life because he was bored. The least I would have expected would have been for him to have served time. I just think it is a joke. It is terrible. It is bloody awful if they think that is the price of a life in this country."

Sheriff Smith said the accident had tragic consequences, but added she was unable to take that into account in sentencing.

Road-safety campaigners last night said the case highlighted the value of a long-overdue new offence of causing death by careless driving, which comes into force across the UK next week.

Isobel Brydie, from the Scottish Campaign against Irresponsible Drivers, said the new offence would close a loophole.

"There's no other criminal law in the land where the consequences of the action are not taken into account," she said. "It is so hard to sit beside the parents in a court case. You try to prepare them for the fact that the death cannot be taken into account, but it's still a shattering experience. Thankfully this loophole will no longer exist."

The court was told that Tod, a laminate fabricator, had stolen his stepfather's car because he was bored one evening.

Tod killed his friend after spinning out of control as he tried to negotiate a bend at 60mph and crashed into a field.

At the time he was a learner driver who had had less than a dozen lessons and he had no licence or insurance.

He admitted during a trial that he decided to drive "just as fast as he could".

Tod, from Milnathort, admitted taking and driving the car on 25 August last year. He also admitted driving on the B920 Scotlandwell to Ballingry road while having no insurance and while not displaying L-plates.

He denied driving carelessly and causing the crash, but was found guilty of that charge after a trial at the court. Tod said he was travelling at the 60mph speed limit when he became aware of a bend suddenly appearing ahead of them.

Tod claimed another car had approached and he had been forced to swerve.

"It was coming towards me too fast and I saw it cross over on to the side of the road I was on," he said. "I swerved to miss. I pulled the car to the left and then back to the right. I lost control of the car and it went over the embankment."

The car then went up an embankment and somersaulted through the air before bouncing three times and finishing in a field 150 feet from the road.

Fiscal depute Stuart Richardson said: "Like a lot of young people you were just going as fast as you could." Tod replied: "Pretty much, yes."

Mr Ness, of Oakbank Crescent, Perth, had been working as an apprentice bricklayer and planned to join the Royal Marines.

New law closes loophole that lets killer motorists avoid jail

THE new offence of death by careless driving will allow courts expressly to consider the fatal consequences.

It is intended to allow judges to take account of the enormous harm that comes from careless driving which causes death. The law cannot be retrospectively applied – only incidents which occur on or after 18 August can be prosecuted under the crime.

Campaigners have been waiting more than two decades for the law change. It will mean more custodial sentences and community sentences where in the past offenders would have received a fine.

However, there is a possibility that offenders in Scotland will be treated differently to those south of the Border. Sentencing guidelines have been drawn up in England and Wales, but none currently exists in Scotland.