Judge speaks out as driver jailed over boy's death

Published on Monday 17 August 2009 22:57

A WOMAN who caused the death of a 13-year-old boy in a head-on crash was jailed for four years yesterday, as a judge warned the courts would do all they could to improve safety on Scotland's roads.

Dawn Lovell, 32, pulled out to overtake a tanker on a blind summit and smashed into a car coming the other way.

Connor Finlayson, a pupil at Carluke High School, was a passenger in the other car, driven by his mother, Jackie McMillan, 31. He died in hospital. His mother spent several weeks in hospital, missing Connor's funeral.

The dead boy's father, Anthony Finlayson, 37, of Forth, Lanarkshire, said as he left the High Court in Edinburgh: "I am not happy with the sentence."

Judge Lord Turnbull told Lovell, of Battismains, Lanark, the mother of three boys, that he accepted she had not intended to take a life, and that she was genuinely remorseful.

"However, you deliberately flouted the well-recognised rules of proper driving.

"It is important for the courts to drive home the message of the dangers that can result from dangerous driving."

Lovell admitted causing Connor's death by dangerous driving on the A706 Lanark to Bo'ness road near Forth at 8:35pm on 24 March last year.