Cocaine-fuelled Seat Leon driver narrowly avoided pedestrian during high-speed Harehills chase

Officers had been looking for the black Seat Leon after it was involved in a serious collision days before, and switched on their blue lights when they spotted it on Harehills Avenue on October 30 last year.

Mohamed Khalid Malik pulled over, and the as one officer got out, he then accelerated away running a first red light onto Roundhay Road. He then ran another and narrowly a person crossing the street.

Reaching speeds up to 54mph he took the police on chase along Markham Avenue, Shepherds Place and Pasture Road. He eventually lost control of the car, hit a kerb and collided with an Audi heading in the opposite direction. He then reversed, hitting the pursuing police car.

Officers got out and ordered him to switch the engine, prosecutor Ella Embleton told Leeds Crown Court. Once under arrest, 47-year-old Malik apologised to officers, but then gave a no-comment interview.

He has 29 previous convictions for 64 offences, including two for dangerous driving in 1999 and 2003. He was convicted of driving while banned in 2016. He remains banned from driving until at least April.

Malik, of Hill Top Mount, Chapeltown, admitted dangerous driving, and two counts of being over the limit for drugs. The court heard there was no suggestion was involved in the Seat Leon accident days prior to the chase.

Mitigating on his behalf, James Holding said: “He knows he should not have been driving, he knew he had drugs in his system and panicked and drove off.

"It was a very poor course of driving but nowhere near the worst you will have seen. He was driving around in squares with no hope of getting away from police. He is genuinely remorseful for his actions.”

Judge Robin Mairs jailed Malik for 16 months and banned him from driving for four years, pointing to his previous offences.

He said: “You made a determined attempt to get way from officers. You showed a complete and utter disregard for every other road user. You have repeated failures to observe court orders prohibiting you from driving and breached community sentences that the courts have mercifully given you in the past.”