A DRUG-driver who was 30 times the legal limit for a cocaine by-product when he crashed into another motorist at high speed on the M6 near Carlisle has been jailed.
The city’s crown court heard how Thomas Jones, 23, was travelling “at something like 100mph” when he careered into an electrician’s work van close to Todhills on the early evening of February 10 this year.
The van – travelling below 70mph – was shunted into the central reservation, collided with a barrier and then rebounded into Jones’s uninsured BMW. Jones stopped a short distance away, but then struggled to spell a false name he gave police who were called to the scene.
Suspicious officers detained Jones, who was found to be 30 times the legal limit for a metabolite of cocaine. He was also 1.4 times the limit for the class A drug itself, and twice the limit for the main active ingredient of cannabis.
The other motorist was injured, later needed physiotherapy and had assessed the cost of damage to his vehicle and items inside as more than £3,600.
Jones, of Browning Crescent, Wolverhampton, admitted perverting the course of justice, three counts of driving with the proportion of a specified drug above the limit and three other motoring offences – including careless driving.
He was jailed for eight months, and must serve a 12-month driving ban when released.
Describing Jones’s cocaine metabolite reading as “extraordinary”, Judge James Adkin told him: “It is pure good fortune that the van driver was not more seriously injured – or killed – by your actions.”
