You’re lucky to be alive
JUDGE’S RAP AS DERBY CRASH DUO ESCAPE JAIL
DERBY COUNTY stars tom Lawrence and Mason Bennett have avoided jail after pleading guilty to drink driving and failing to stop at the scene of a serious car crash that ended captain Richard Keogh’s season.
the pair were warned in court that their accident after a team-bonding dinner last month ‘ could have led to death’ and it was ‘perhaps remarkable’ that they had escaped uninjured.
they were handed 12-month community orders, must carry out 180 hours of unpaid work and were disqualified from driving for two years.
Prosecutor Marianne Connally told Southern Derbyshire Magistrates’ Court that, shortly before midnight on September 24, Lawrence’s car had driven into the back of Bennett’s, adding: ‘It was entirely by chance there were paramedics in the area at the time.’
Both players fled the scene out of ‘panic’. they failed breathalyser tests when they returned.
In mitigation, Lawrence’s solicitor Shaun Draycott spoke of how the Wales international had become ‘quite dependent’ on alcohol following the death of his mother in May. Wales coach Ryan Giggs and Derby’s former manager Frank Lampard provided references for Lawrence.
However, Mr Draycott acknowledged the midfielder had made a ‘gross, gross error of judgment’ when getting behind the wheel.
Lucy Whitaker, defending Bennett, told the court the 23-year- old striker sincerely regrets his actions. She said on the night, Bennett had eaten a meal, had some drinks and felt ‘peer pressured’ into having a Jager bomb shot which made him sick.
on his decision to drive, she said: ‘He lived less than three miles from where they were eating and drinking. He thought wrongly that he would be oK.’
Derby — who fined both players six weeks’ wages — had laid on cars for the squad when the event finished at 8pm, but some players stayed on at the Joiner’s Arms pub. A probation officer told the court that Bennett had been ‘extremely concerned about the prospect of a custodial sentence’, while the officer who interviewed Lawrence said going to prison would ‘mess with his head’.
District Judge taaffe told the players they were ‘extremely fortunate’ to be alive. ‘You had been drinking, you have been involved in a collision that could have led to death and did lead to the injury of a passenger,’ he said.
Judge taaffe added the most serious aggravating factor was that they had left the scene ‘when a fellow professional was injured in the back of one of the vehicles’. Although Keogh was not named in court, he was left unconscious in Lawrence’s car. He suffered a careerthreatening knee injury.
Lawrence and Bennett must also pay £85 costs and a £90 victim surcharge.