A drunk and drugged-up driver killed his 15-year-old friend when he crashed into an oncoming car, a court heard.
Brandon Jefferson-Howe was more than three times over the limit when he got behind the wheel in the early hours of Saturday July 30.
Connor Thompson was in the passenger seat when the 20-year-old driver ‘failed to negotiate an easy left-hand bend on a residential street’ and collided with another driver. The 15-year-old tragically died but Jefferson-Howe refused to identify him to police, leaving the teenager’s family to wonder for ‘the longest hours of their lives’.
Teesside Crown Court heard how Jefferson-Howe may have been racing another car at the time of the accident but was not able to determine this for sure. The judge said to him: ‘I am not able to conclude that you were in a race but that is just splitting hairs – you were clearly driving quickly after another car driving quickly and perhaps encouraging each other to drive quickly.’Brandon Jefferson-Howe has been jailed for five years Connor’s mum Kelly Thompson said: ‘As a family we were sat for hours waiting to find out if it was Connor, we knew it was him when he didn’t walk into the house but we just couldn’t accept it.