A drink-driving Yorkshire teenager who moonlighted as a taxi driver ended up killing one of his passengers in a horrific crash.
The 19-year-old left a birthday party to go touting for business in Pontefract. He picked up four men, including a father-of-two outside a local nightclub, and offered to drive them home for £10.
But on the way, the teenager began driving dangerously fast. one of the other passengers that night, said "He was travelling too fast for the road. I told him we were in no rush, but he wasn't listening."
Approaching a bend in a 50mph zone at 65mph, Hitch ran off the road and into a line of trees. His Ford Fiesta Zetec flipped over, coming to rest the right way up but facing the opposite direction.
When emergency services arrived, they found the father-of-two's body hanging out of a rear window. the teenager, who panicked and fled the scene, later came to his senses and called 999.
When asked why he had been running the unofficial taxi service, he explained that he had been struggling to pay his car insurance premiums ever since buying the Fiesta.
In court, he admitted causing death by careless driving while over the prescribed alcohol limit.
He was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison and banned from driving for two years - meaning his motor insurance premiums will be even more expensive after he is released.