3x limit drink driver jailed after hitting teen cyclist

Friday 27 July 2018

Stunned drivers and a path of destruction was left in the wake of a van driver earlier this year, as he sped along the west coast while more than three times over the drink drive limit before hitting a cyclist.

After being arrested by Guernsey Police, the man was yesterday sentenced by the island's Royal Court to 21 months in prison and a 10 year driving ban for dangerous driving, drink driving and for leaving the scene of an accident.

Callum Hill-Smith, who was 25 at the time of the incident in April, was first seen driving his grey van through St Peters, where he overtook another driver at great speed after rear-ending them.

He was then seen by a handful of other drivers, each of whom he overtook at dangerous speeds and at dangerous locations as he travelled onto the coast road, through Perelle and toward Vazon.

Hill-Smith's drunken path culminated outside the Waves apartments at Vazon, where he went to overtake another driver, and collided with a cyclist while on the wrong side of the road.

The young cyclist was thrown from his bike, and came to struggling to breathe and with pain in his arm. He had suffered a broken right arm, skin abrasions and a number of deep flesh wounds.

That 17-year-old cyclist has since had to have a metal plate installed in his arm during surgery to help the break recover, he also provided a victim impact statement to the court.

At the time of the accident members of the public came to the victim's aid, but Hill-Smith reportedly fled the scene of the accident in his van, without stopping, at an even greater speed than before.

He was arrested later that day after officers found him in a Castel hedgerow with a bleeding nose, near to where a grey van had been abandoned. Members of the public who had seen Hill-Smith pointed officers in the right direction. When given a breath test immediately after his arrest, he tested for 121micrograms of alcohol to 100ml of breath, when the limit is 35.

Guernsey's Royal Court, where three charges were laid against Hill-Smith, the first to have, on the 23 April 2018, driven at Vazon while over the alcohol limit, the second to have driven in a manner dangerous to the public, and the third to have left the scene of an accident.

During his mitigation, the defendant said from the start that the teenage cyclist and his family "deserved justice" for his actions.

But he also had a number of previous convictions on his record, including several speeding charges and a previous drink drive charge from 2014, where he was taken off of the roads for 30 months and fined £700.

Judge Russell Finch said the situation had been aggravated by these recent convictions and the "powerful victim impact statement".

"Whatever your personal problems, they should not have alarming consequences for people going and their business," he said.

Pictured top: The scene of the accident in April. The black car was not involved in the accident and was a member of the public who stopped to assist.