Crash driver spared jail... to do degree
Sheriff even hopes that unpaid work won’t interrupt his studies
A GIFTED student has been spared jail despite taking his mother’s BMW and causing a fireball crash which left three people seriously injured.
Learner driver Ross Broomfield walked free from court after his lawyer said sending him to prison would ruin his chances of completing his degree course.
Instead, a sheriff ordered him to complete 200 hours of unpaid work over eight months, so that he could carry out the community payback during the Easter and summer holidays.
Perth Sheriff Court heard Broomfield was ‘euphoric’ after earning a place to do a Masters degree at Strathclyde University and took his mother’s car from the family home.
The 18-year-old was driving on the wrong side of the road when he caused a head-on crash which wrote off both vehicles and injured three people.
Two of those hurt had to crawl for their lives as their car caught fire and residents from a nearby house rushed to tackle the flames.
Broomfield – who was described as a model pupil at school – admitted he had become ‘too big for his boots’ as he waited to start a computing and electronic engineering Masters.
Sheriff Lindsay Foulis told the teenager he was fortunate the accident had not caused fatalities and ruined the lives of all of the people involved.
He said: ‘You’re a young man who comes before this court with excellent references. I very much suspect that on the night in question there was an element of teenage euphoria. I know the consequences have been made clear to you. A number of lives could have been ruined.’
Broomfield, of Dollar, Clackmannanshire, admitted taking and driving away the BMW 1 series from outside his family home on August 5 last year.
He admitted causing serious injury to his passenger as well as the driver and passenger of the other car he drove into.
Broomfield admitted driving on the wrong side of the road and into the path of the Renault Laguna, which exploded in a ball of flames.
The teenager also admitted driving without insurance and while he was a learner driver.
On Wednesday, Sheriff Foulis praised Broomfield for showing his ‘true character’ in the immediate wake of the crash by helping the victims and immediately confessing to the police that he had taken his mother’s car. He also told them he had been drinking, but was found to be under the legal limit.
Fiscal depute Catriona Dalrymple said: ‘After the collision the car caught fire. Both the driver and the passenger managed to exit before collapsing on the grass verge. Residents nearby managed to put the fire out.’
Defence solicitor Brian Tait said: ‘It was an extremely foolish thing for him to do. He was probably too big for his own boots. He has shown genuine remorse.
‘A custodial sentence is not going to achieve any more for the victims, but it would prevent him from carrying on his studies.’
Sheriff Foulis said the unpaid work was an alternative to custody and told Broomfield, who was banned from driving for two years, he ‘hoped it would not interfere too much with his studies’.
‘Too big for his boots’