Crash passengers begged 'show-off' driver to stop

Elliot Lucas was driving at speeds approaching 90 mph before the crash

A dangerous driver caused a crash that seriously injured four people on a night out when the car he was driving hit an embankment and trees before bursting into flames.

Elliot Lucas, 20, from Llantwit Major, Vale of Glamorgan, lost control after overtaking a milk van on a dual carriageway in Cardiff on 1 September 2022.

He admitted four counts of causing serious injury by dangerous driving and was given three years and four months in youth detention at Cardiff Crown Court.

Passengers said they were being thrown from side to side because of Lucas's driving and pleaded and screamed at him to slow down and stop showing off.

Lucas was on a night out in Llantwit Major to celebrate his friend's 20th birthday.

The group grew to six young people who had known each other from school, including four who were visiting home from university.

Lucas drove them into Cardiff in an overloaded Fiat Punto, with three women in the group sitting in the back with a male passenger lying across their laps, the court heard.

Before setting off Lucas told member of the group he was not drunk and had had just one drink.

Forensic evidence suggested minutes before the crash at about 23:30 BST he was driving at speeds approaching 90 mph (145 km/h).

The crash was on the A4232 dual carriageway in Cardiff

One passenger texted a friend to say the driver was going too fast and that she was scared.

The car hit a central reservation then crashed into an embankment and trees. CCTV footage showed the car bursting into flames.

Lilly Starkey, who was due to start at Bath University that autumn, was trapped inside until emergency responders arrived.

Police bodycam footage showed casualties lying on the verge as officers tried to extinguish the flames.

Ms Starkey and university student Rupert Owen were taken to hospital with severe, life-changing injuries.

Two other passengers suffered serious injuries.

Lucas was arrested at the scene of the crash and was later found to have 124 mg of alcohol per 100 ml of blood, above the legal limit of 80 ml.

During sentencing the court was shown footage from two weeks before the crash of Lucas filming himself driving the same car at nearly 120 mph (193 km/h) with no hands on the wheel.

The judge, the recorder of Cardiff Tracey Lloyd-Clarke, said Lucas has shown "disregard for the rule of law and the warnings of others".

On top of the jail sentence she ordered his disqualification from driving for eight years and eight months.

In her victim personal statement read to the court, Ms Starkey described how the crash left her in constant pain, set her back in her first year of university and made her fearful of driving.

"Every time I get in a car I think I'm going to get in another crash that will set me back again," the court heard. "If I had known the driver was drinking I would never have gotten in the car that night."

Mr Owen's statement said the crash had also set him back in university and left him with lifelong injuries.

The other two victims also described being traumatised by the crash and its aftermath.

Prosecutor Timothy Evans said the defendant made a deliberate decision to ignore the rules of the road, showed "disregard for the risk of danger to the passengers and indeed other people", and "persistent disregard of the warnings of others to slow down".

William Bebb, defending, said Lucas he recognised the “stupidity of what he did that night and that he must pay the price”.

"His life will never be the same, but he knows it is just a fraction of the suffering of those who were injured."