Driver who escaped Wakefield police locked up for two hours before judge's U-turn
A motorist who ran from police and was told he must go to jail was released hours later after the judge made an unusual U-turn on the sentence.
Thomas Kelly was initially given a 14-weeks’ immediate custody after admitting a charge of escaping lawful custody, and possession of ketamine.
He had been pulled over in Wakefield due to not wearing a seatbelt, but officers tried to detain him when they noticed he had a hammer in the centre console of the black Peugeot.
Kelly, who has post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) wriggled free, injuring one officer’s finger and then fled. He handed himself into police three hours later.
Appearing at Leeds Crown Court, in clear disbelief at the initial sentence, asked the judge to repeat it before launching into a tirade.
He said: “I have done nothing wrong sir. I do not deserve this. They should not have arrested me over the hammer.
“I was only protecting myself. They should not have manhandled me like they did.
“I might look like trouble but I’m a good person.”
But two hours later Judge Howard Crowson brought the back case to court and in a rare move opted to then suspend the 14-week sentence for six months.
He called it an “unusual case of escape” but acknowledged Kelly has PTSD and said it was “reasonable to reflect upon the sentence”.
He called for Kelly to be released from custody, despite having being driven away to prison from the court building by that stage.
Prosecutor Elizabeth Noble said officers had signalled for Kelly to pull over on College Grove Road in Wakefield shortly after midday on November 21 last year.
He got out of the vehicle and once they spotted the hammer, they told him he was under arrest and tried to put the cuffs on him.
Body-worn camera footage was played to the court which showed the 32-year-old then struggling before running off.
The officers later found two bags of ketamine in the car. Kelly gave himself up three hours later, admitting during interview that the ketamine was his, and that he had used force to escape.
Mitigating, Aimilia Katsoulakis said Kelly, of Arncliffe Road, Wakefield suffered from PTSD since he was a child, and used ketamine to self medicate.
She said his decision to run was “spontaneous and impulsive” and that he feared for his own safety when the officer grabbed him.