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news
justice-2060093_1920Motorist speeding at 80mph before he killed schoolboy cycling home jailed for five years
A speeding driver who hit and killed a 16-year-old cycling home from school has today been jailed for five years and disqualified from driving for 12 years and six months.
Sami Ula Jabbar, who had a previous conviction for careless driving and was on bail at the time of the crash, heard his sentence at the High Court in Glasgow after admitting to causing death by dangerous driving.
The court heard that the 29-year-old was driving his Mercedes at around 80mph before he hit Harley Smith as the teenager cycled home from school.
CCTV footage from the incident on the dark and foggy evening of 6 November 2020 showed the motorist speeding through residential streets in Laurieston, Falkirk, well in excess of the 30mph limit, while one witness reported telling her husband the driver was "going to kill someone" just moments before the fatal collision.
Smith, a pupil at St Mungo's High School, was struck on Polmont Road just before 9pm and died from a fatal head injury at the scene. Prosecuting, Alex Prentice QC reported a witness had seen "the car screeching to a halt. A person being propelled into the air to the height of what seemed like the top of the lamp post."
"You drove at 80mph — a speed which is breathtaking," Judge Lord Mulholland told him. "If you had driven at a safe speed this tragedy would not have happened. Harley Smith would be alive today realising his full potential. It is clear he was a fine young man loved by many."
Jabbar told police the cyclist was wearing dark clothing and had come "out of nowhere".
"I never seen him and then...boom. He came right on top of the windscreen," he continued.
As the driver was led from court, some family and friends of Smith reacted angrily to Jabbar. The Daily Record reports a shout of "I hope you rot. He was 16 years old. You stole him" was heard, while someone else shouted: "Look what you have done to us."
David Green, Scotland's Procurator Fiscal for homicide and major crime, concluded: "The reckless and dangerous driving of Sami Ula Jabbar has had the most devastating effect on many lives.
"It robbed young Harley Smith of his promising future and left his loving family bereft. The consequences of dangerous driving cannot be overstated, as this case demonstrates so tragically.
"Our Road Traffic Investigation Unit is committed to prosecuting these crimes at the highest level."
Dan is the road.cc news editor and joined in 2020 having previously written about nearly every other sport under the sun for the Express, and the weird and wonderful world of non-league football for The Non-League Paper. Dan has been at road.cc for four years and mainly writes news and tech articles as well as the occasional feature. He has hopefully kept you entertained on the live blog too.
Never fast enough to take things on the bike too seriously, when he's not working you'll find him exploring the south of England by two wheels at a leisurely weekend pace, or enjoying his favourite Scottish roads when visiting family. Sometimes he'll even load up the bags and ride up the whole way, he's a bit strange like that.
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18 comments
First time I've heard of a killer motorist's punishment being worse than a killer cyclist's.
.
Not enough. By a long, long way.
.
I'm guessing according to Mr Chapps the driver wasn't displaying number plates, wasn't insured.......
Should this person ever be allowed to drive again? He had committed previous offences. This one was horrible. I cannot imagine how the family of the lad feel.
Banned for fewer years than poor Harley had been on earth. An absolute disgrace.
Simply not enough
When will the courts finally start passing sentences that really set an exapmle and are a proper deterrent?
Sentences don't deter - that's been shown by a number of studies.
What deters is a high chance of being caught.
Motoring offences are particularly difficult to deter because the people committing them generally do not believe that any harm will result from their actions. They take risks they believe will pay off, because generally they do. They are therefore not deterred by thought of what would happen if they kill or injure someone because they just don't believe that will happen. There is too much dangerous driving around to believe it's all the work of psychopaths who don't care if someone dies. Rather it's the work of over confident over optimistic risk takers.
Your best bet is to police speeding, careless driving (cutting corners), drink/drug driving properly - get those drivers off the road on driving bans *before* their luck runs out. I'd go for automatic ban on 6 points, no "extreme hardship" exemption, compulsory extended retest for *all* drivers serving a ban when their ban comes to an end and mandatory prison sentences for driving while disqualified so that a broken driving ban has to be served where driving is impossible.
"The court heard he has previous convictions, including for careless driving and had been freed under two bail orders from Falkirk Sheriff Court at the time of the crash."
We need a review of traffic laws and penalties before wasting resources on death by cyclists laws.
so how on earth did he qualify for the lower end of the tariff?! The third off means the original tariff was about 8 years, well below the maximum which this should have started at - the aggravating facts on the day plus the prior convictions and bail breaking.
Someone remind me: what's the maximum possible sentence for causing death by dangerous driving? But we need a new law of Causing Death by Dangerous Cycling because all those cyclists get away with it.
14 yrs
its life imprisonment now, it was raised in April this year. But this case would still only qualify for 14 years because it happened nearly 2 years ago, and has taken this long to get to this point.
So actually 9 1/3 years because 1/3 discount for guilty plea. Plus he didn't kill the Queen and all her corgis so would never qualify for that maximum either.
And I bet if anyone had previously asked Mr Jabbar whether he thought he was a good and safe driver, he would have answered in the positive...
Terrible.
I think it was MarkandCharlie on Twitter who said he gets more grief when he questions the standard of someone's driving than he does when he's arresting thieves and the like....
And I bet if anyone
had previously askedasks Mr Jabbar whether hethoughtthinks hewasis a good and safe driver, hewould havewill answeredin the positive...One survey found that 98% of drivers thought they were above average - but that was in the States
British Drivers: "hold my phone"