Red-light driver ploughed into car

A RECKLESS driver was told by a judge that he was lucky not to have killed someone, after deliberately speeding through a red traffic light and ploughing into another car.

David Holt (24) slammed into the vehicle, careered into a bollard, spun 360 degrees then hit a stone wall and an unmarked police car.

Holt had been spotted minutes before by a traffic officer, who thought he was driving dangerously in wet and foggy conditions and turned to follow him along Oldham Road Denshaw — but couldn’t go quickly enough to catch him.

Manchester’s Minshull Street Crown Court was told the Peugeot 306 was next seen running the red traffic signal at roadworks, where traffic was restricted to one lane.

A Honda Civic containing two passengers had been driven through the lights towards the speeding car..

Brendon O’Leary, prosecuting, told the court that “miraculously”, none of the occupants of the Honda had been seriously hurt. Two officers in the unmarked police car hit in the accident escaped with minor injuries.

Holt, who has an 18-month-old daughter, had already been convicted of driving while disqualified twice before.

Thomas Wild, defending, said Holt had remained at the scene, in the early hours of August 19 and had made no attempt to excuse what he had done.

Sentencing him, judge Mushtaq Khokhar, said: “Given the weather conditions at the time, at that speed, an accident was bound to happen.”

Tyre-fitter Holt, of Torre Road, Bradford, was given a 12-month sentence suspended for 18 months, and he will be subject to supervision by the probation service for 12 months. He was also ordered to carry out 100 hours unpaid work in the community, and will be subject to a nightly curfew by electronic tag for four months.

These came on top of a two-year driving ban and a requirement to take an extended driving test before getting his licence back.