A driver who caused an A66 crash which left a fellow motorist with injuries so severe she now walks with a limp has been given a suspended prison sentence.
Dean Shakespeare, 45, was heading home on Monday, August 1 2022, after working four 12-hour shifts as artist liaison manager at Kendal Calling music festival.
Shakespeare was significantly unwell and fatigued, Carlisle Crown Court heard. And at 4.30pm his eastbound Nissan Qashqai veered suddenly across from lane two of a dual carriageway section and into collision with a Fiat Panda preparing to leave a layby.
Fiat driver Caroline Musimwa, of Penrith, was travelling to visit her sister in Cambridge, and had stopped photograph scenery near Stainmore which she felt was reminiscent of her Zimbabwe homeland.
“She remembers walking back to her car, and waking up in hospital 23 days later,” said prosecutor Brendan Burke.
Ms Musimwa was rendered unconscious by what one lorry driver witness called a massive impact as her car was up an embankment.
She was airlifted to Middlesbrough’s James Cook University Hospital and suffered multiple injuries which included eight rib fractures, kidney damage, a ruptured diaphragm and whiplash. Doctors placed her in an induced coma. Her spleen was removed and a lung drained.
HGV dash-cam footage captured the collision. Shakespeare suffered bruising and was described by witnesses looking distant and vacant in the aftermath.
He later admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving, and drug-driving. Tests showed the level of ecstasy in his bloodstream was above the legal driving limit. However a judge had since concluded after hearing evidence that he hadn’t knowingly ingested the substance.
Shakespeare had accepted and consumed a fizzy drink he believed to be water after finishing work at Kendal Calling the previous evening.
He told the court: “I would like to apologise to Ms Musimwa for any injuries that have happened to her from this accident.”
An impact statement revealed that she walks with a limp, has been medicated with morphine for persistent pain and has day-to-day memory deficits. Her work as a carer is also affected.
After hearing mitigation, Judge Barker concluded there was a realistic prospect of rehabilitation. He suspended the defendant’s 24-month jail term for two years.
Shakespeare, of South View Terrace, York, must complete 240 hours’ unpaid work, a night-time curfew and was banned from consuming alcohol for 56 days. The judge also imposed a 30-month driving ban and extended re-test.
