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Teenager who ran over PC Dave Phillips jailed for 20 years Teenager who ran over PC Dave Phillips jailed for 20 years
(35 minutes later)
A teenage car thief has been jailed for 20 years after being found guilty of the manslaughter of a policeman by mowing him down in a stolen pick-up truck while being chased by other officers. A teenage car thief who mowed down a police officer at high speed in a stolen pick-up truck has been sentenced to 20 years in a young offenders institution.
Clayton Williams, 19, killed PC Dave Phillips just three weeks after coming out of jail on licence for crashing another stolen car in a police pursuit. Clayton Williams, 19, was found guilty of manslaughter over the hit-and-run death of PC Dave Phillips in Merseyside in the early hours of 5 October last year.
He drove at the 34-year-old officer at around 50mph in the three-ton Mitsubishi L200 truck in what the prosecution alleged was a “cowardly and merciless act”. The teenager, who showed no emotion as he was jailed on Monday, was cleared of murder after jurors found he did not intend to kill or seriously injure the officer.
But jurors at Manchester crown court cleared him of murder and convicted him of the alternative count of manslaughter, after finding that he did not intend to kill or seriously injure the officer. Williams drove at the 34-year-old officer at about 50mph in the three-ton Mitsubishi L200 truck in what the prosecution described as a “cowardly and merciless act”.
Phillips, a father of two, was thrown into the air and died almost instantly from “catastrophic” injuries in the incident in Wallasey Dock Link Road, Merseyside, in the early hours of 5 October last year. He was being chased by officers at the time and struck Phillips as the officer crouched on the kerbside laying a tyre-puncturing stinger device to end the 80mph chase.
Cannabis-addict Williams, who said he had been using the drug since the age of six, admitted his dangerous driving caused Phillips’ death, but maintained he did not intend to injure anyone and only wanted to evade capture and not go back to jail. The court heard that Williams mounted the central reservation and drove at the father-of-two, throwing him into the air. He died almost instantly from “catastrophic” injuries.
The officer had been crouched on the kerbside deploying a tyre-puncturing stinger device to end the 80mph chase when Williams mounted the central reservation and drove at him. Williams had been released from jail on licence for crashing another stolen car in a police pursuit three weeks before the fatal collision.
Williams told the jury of nine women and three men that he was trying to drive around the stinger spikes and did not see Phillips until the second before impact. He narrowly missed Phillips’ colleague, PC Thomas Birkett, 23, and was earlier cleared by the jury of a charge of attempted grievous bodily harm with intent against that officer. In the witness box at Manchester crown court, Williams told the jury he was trying to drive around the stinger spikes and did not see Phillips until the second before impact.
Pursuing police cars radioed: “Officer down! Officer down!” and stopped the chase to tend to their colleague who lay dying in the road as Williams vanished into the night. He narrowly missed Phillips’ colleague, PC Thomas Birkett, 23, and was earlier cleared by the jury of a charge of attempted grievous bodily harm with intent against that officer.
He dumped the car, showered, burned his clothes and gave his phone away before he was arrested the next day. Pursuing police cars radioed “Officer down! Officer down!” and stopped the chase to tend to their colleague who lay dying in the road as Williams vanished into the night.
Phillips’ widow, Jen, 29, and the couple’s daughters, Abigail, seven, and Sophie, three, described him as a loving, caring “super daddy” in moving floral tributes laid at the scene of his death. He dumped the car, went to his aunt’s house, showered, burnt his clothes, gave away his phone and ran to a youth hostel where his girlfriend lived. He was arrested by armed police the following day.
On Monday, Mrs Phillips, his sisters Hannah Whieldon and Kate, and mother and father, Robin and Carol, watched from the public gallery as the jury delivered its verdict. Phillip Stuart, 30, who was a passenger in the vehicle at the time of the incident, had pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to burglary and aggravated taking of a vehicle and was given a six-year jail term.
During the two-week trial they had relived the final moments of his life as a video recording of the incident was played frame by frame, over and over again in court as Williams denied murder. Jurors were not told full details of Williams’ previous criminal record or evidence from other defendants, who had already pleaded guilty, that contradicted his own story.
Mrs Phillips wiped tears from her eyes as the verdict was delivered, but there was no reaction from Williams in the dock. His co-accused Stuart told police that seconds before hitting Phillips, Williams said to him: “Watch this!” After dumping the car Williams went to his aunt’s house in Wallasey and “broke down crying”, telling the jury he needed a cuddle from his grandmother.
He is due to be sentenced shortly. Stuart later told police he called a family member to say: “I’m going down. I’ve killed a bizzie.”
Williams had smoked four or five cannabis joints and was on his way back from a drug deal to buy more cannabis before coming across a premises, Oxton Estates in Birkenhead and agreeing to burgle the property with Stuart, at about 1am on 5 October.
Williams told jurors: “I was scared. Everyone was telling me I was going to get life. I only just got out after a short sentence. I didn’t intend to kill him, I just went out to rob the shop.”
After the verdicts, Williams’ widow, Jen Phillips, 28, said in an emotional victim impact statement from the witness box that she felt “numb, shock and overwhelming anger”.
She added: “Dave did not stand a chance, he was just trying to do his job, [to] stop Williams in a stolen vehicle before he hurt members of the public.
“He loved his job as a police officer but he loves his family more. He would do anything to make sure me and the girls were OK, he was the perfect husband and father.”
She said Williams had destroyed their young family and stolen her husband, adding: “I and my children are the ones living a life sentence. The pain and torture will live with me for the rest of my life, he has killed a part of myself, if hell is real I am living in it.”
Their daughters, Abigail, seven, and Sophie, three, are now scared of the dark and scared of monsters, she told the court.
Addressing Williams, judge William Davis said he had been urged to take into account the defendant’s remorse. He added: “But at the time that poor policeman was fighting for his life you were trying to cover up what you had done. That is not remorse.”
In a statement issued through police after sentencing, Jen Phillips said she and her husband would discuss how his uniform had become a target for criminals to abuse.
She added: “Just walking along the street, Dave was regularly spat at, assaulted, sworn at, and so on. He was a man just doing his job.
“However, since Dave was taken from us I have received so much support from the public, all over the country and beyond, and it has given me hope that the police are still respected and thought of highly.
“I want to thank you all from the bottom of my heart for all the kind words, letters, cards, gifts and donations. I feel completely overwhelmed by it all and has helped me through this terrible dark time.
“I have kept every single card and letter, so when the girls are older they can read them and see how loved and respected their daddy is. My girls will be raised knowing there is more good in this world than bad. Thank you.”
DS Richie Carr said: “We welcome the verdict and hope that it will give some closure to PC Phillips’ family, but ultimately nothing can bring him back and his family are still struggling to come to terms with his loss.”