August 24, 2015 6.39 pm This story is over 108 months old

Newly qualified Lincoln driver denies causing death by careless driving

Double fatality: A teenage motorist lost control of his car causing a fatal collision which left two people dead, a jury at Lincoln Crown Court heard.
Lincoln Crown Court. Photo: The Lincolnite

A teenage motorist lost control of his car causing a fatal collision which left two people dead, a jury at Lincoln Crown Court heard.

Aaron Baker, 18, of Steeping Court, Lincoln, who had passed his test just three months before the incident, was on a day out to the seaside with three friends when he collided with an oncoming vehicle near Alford.

Jeremy Janes, prosecuting, said that 16-year-old Matthew Ellis, a passenger in Baker’s car, was killed along with Jean Thomas, aged 70, who was a front seat passenger in the other vehicle.

He said that Baker and his friends initially drove to Cleethorpes and then made their way to Mablethorpe where they stopped off for food and to play on the arcades.

The fatal collision occurred on the A1104 at Snape Hill as they headed for Skegness.

The other driver, Alan Thomas, was travelling with his wife Jean to their home in Mablethorpe after collecting their daughter and grandson from Skegness Railway Station.

Janes told the jury: “Nobody is suggesting that when he set out on for a trip to the seaside with three of his friends that this defendant intended any of the consequences which occurred that afternoon. We do not say that this was a deliberate bad piece of driving.

“His driving, the prosecution say, fell below the standard that would be expected of any ordinary competent driver even for but a minute, if that is all it took. He lost control of his vehicle.

“It resulted in the death of one of his friends in his car and the death of Jean Thomas, a front seat passenger in a car being driven by her husband in the opposite direction.

“The prosecution don’t suggest he was speeding. His speed was probably in the region of 47 mph.

“He had only passed his test in January of last year, a matter of two to three months before this incident.

“He lost control of his car and went into the front corner of Mr Thomas’s car. The results were catastrophic. There were two dead. Everyone else received significant injuries. There were a number of broken limbs, a number of cuts. Some of them had to be cut out of their respective vehicles.”

Baker denies two charges of causing death by careless driving on April 18, 2014.

This is an ongoing trial in front of a jury. Comments discretion is advised.