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Drink-driver kills friends in mountainside crash

A drink-driving youngster who killed two of his friends in a car accident has been sent to jail for five years.

23-year-old David Raymond Lewis, from Maesteg in Wales, pleaded guilty to causing the boys' deaths at Swansea Crown Court, following the smash in December 2004.

The court heard how unemployed Lewis was more than one-and-a-half-times over the legal alcohol limit, and had also been smoking cannabis, when he lost control on a bend on a narrow mountain road. Careering off the carriageway, he smashed into rocks, resulting in the deaths of his two passengers, 15-year-old Scott Bond and 19-year-old Gareth Jeremy.

Lewis admitted he was taking the Volkswagen Golf up a mountain to set fire to it at the request of his friend. The friend, Lindsey Rees, was then planning to report the car stolen and make a motor insurance claim on the vehicle. He had offered to give Lewis several cans of lager to commit the 'theft' for him.

Sentencing, Judge John Diehl said, "There is absolutely nothing this court can say or do to turn back the clock or to ease the grief of those who lost their loved ones."

Lewis, who also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud, admitted driving without a licence or car insurance and was jailed for five years and banned from the road for the same period of time.

A spokesman for Hoot Car Insurance Services, the young driver car insurance experts, commented, "Drinking and driving costs lives, just as this tragic case illustrates."