Hit and run killer gets five years in jail

A Chingford motorist who killed a cyclist and then drove off was jailed for five years yesterday.

The Waltham Forest Guardian reports that 37 year-old Ali Altuntas was driving on the A413 in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, last year when he hit 47 year-old council worker Jim Fleming, who died instantly.

The crash made an orphan of Mr Fleming’s 10 year-old son William, who had lost his mother to cervical cancer just a year beforehand.

Altuntas denied causing death by dangerous driving but jurors at Aylesbury Crown Court unanimously found him guilty. He was given four years in jail for that offence and a further year for perverting the course of justice.

The Judge Lord Parmoor told Altuntas, “You were driving at 70 mph. You ploughed into him... You didn't go and check the body, you decided that you wanted to run away to try and avoid conviction. You left him lying there and fled.”