Lorry drug-driver who killed Oxford scientist Dr Ling Felce jailed

Robert Whiting killed Ling Felce after he drove into her at The Plain roundabout on 1 March

An unqualified, uninsured lorry driver who killed an Oxford University scientist while more than eight times over the drug-drive limit has been jailed.

Robert Whiting, 40, admitted causing the death of cyclist Dr Ling Felce, 35, at The Plain roundabout in Oxford on 1 March.

He had taken cocaine the night before.

His long offending record was described as "dire" by a judge, who jailed him for eight years.

Dr Felce's husband James said she was "the light" of their family

Following the sentencing, Dr Felce's husband James told the BBC his wife had a "strong positive impact on the world" and called for changes to be made in the city to help protect cyclists more.

Whiting was driving a 32-tonne lorry, owned by Oxford-based company J&A Driveways, when the crash took place at about 14:30 GMT, Oxford Crown Court heard.

A police investigator said the mother-of-two was visible to Whiting for 700m (2,300ft) before the crash, as they both travelled down Headington Road and St Clement's Street, before arriving at The Plain.

Dr Felce, who had been waiting to use the roundabout, was killed instantly, the court heard.

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Whiting has never had a full driving licence and his provisional driving licence ran out in 2002.

He was first banned from driving for 12 months in 2002 and convicted of other driving offences in 2006, 2008, 2010 and 2016.

He was also due in court for driving without a licence and without insurance after police stopped him in Rymers Lane in Oxford, in December.

J&A Driveways is under police investigation.

Dr Felce was born in Malaysia in 1986, and moved to London in 1991 with her parents and sister. She studied biochemistry in Oxford from 2005 and completed a DPhil at Oxford University's clinical pharmacology department.

Described by Oxford University as a scientist of "extraordinary talent", she had been researching immune responses to Covid months before her death.

The CAMS-Oxford Institute recently said its Ling Felce Award would offer financial assistance to "support the next generation of world-leading computational biologists".

CCTV showed Dr Felce cycling and the lorry driven by Whiting behind her moments before the accident

Dr Felce's husband, James, also spoke to the BBC in March about the night he found out his wife had died, having driven past the scene of the crash.

"My immediate thought was about my children. I tried to give them one sort of last, normal evening.

"They asked where Mummy was but I just said, 'She's not coming back tonight, we'll talk about it in the morning.' And it was pancake day so I made them some pancakes and then put them to bed.

"And it was only really once they were asleep that I really let myself really acknowledge it."

He said they all had a "different life now", adding: "I can't look very far ahead now because it's too painful, because we had so many plans."

Sentencing Whiting, Judge Michael Gledhill QC told him: "You snuffed out her life in the matter of a second."

He also banned Whiting from driving for nine years and said he must take an extended retest before he is legally allowed to drive.

Flowers and tributes were left at the roundabout following Dr Felce's death in March