Passenger needed life-saving surgery after drink-driving Leeds builder smashed his 4x4 into Ford Fiesta
A driver who careered head-on into a car after he had been drinking has been jailed.
The driver and passenger of the other car were left badly injured due to David Roughton, who was behind the wheel of his large Nissan Navara.
The 49-year-old admitted two counts of causing serious injury through dangerous driving, and driving while over the legal alcohol limit.
He has a previous conviction for drink driving, Leeds Crown Court was told.
The smash happened on Astley Lane, near to the entrance of St Aidan’s Nature Park in Allerton Bywater, on the evening of March 23 last year.
Two male friends had been travelling in a Ford Fiesta when they encountered Roughton’s blue 4x4 coming the other way.
Roughton was on the wrong side of the road and collided with the Fiesta, forcing the much lighter vehicle through a fence and into foliage.
It happened where the 60mph switches to a 30mph zone, with one witness telling police they estimated Roughton had been travelling between 60 and 70mph at the time.
The driver of the Fiesta was able to pull himself free, but his passenger had to be cut from the wreckage by arriving firefighters.
Roughton was almost twice the legal alcohol limit, it was later found.
The Fiesta driver suffered a broken arm and a head injury.
However, the passenger bore the brunt, suffering a collapsed lung, a life-threatening compression of the heart and windpipe, a broken leg and a broken forearm.
He required several rounds of surgery, prosecutor Esther Bukoye told the court.
Roughton was not interviewed until two months later and admitted being the driver, but initially denied driving dangerously.
A probation officer delivered a report to the court saying that Roughton had been drinking that night and got into an argument with his partner.
Mitigating, Lucy Brown said Roughton did not shirk responsibility, and having seen dashcam footage from the incident, accepted his wrongdoing.
She said: “He says it is the worst thing he has ever done. He bitterly regrets his conduct that day.
“There is genuine remorse and he has done all he can to put things right since.”
The court heard that Roughton, formerly of North Lane, Oulton, was now sofa surfing.
The court heard that he had eight previous convictions, including the drink driving from 2015.
Judge Simon Batiste told Roughton: “You did not slow down and were still driving at a speed inappropriate for the road conditions.
“You were over the limit for alcohol. They had absolutely no chance to avoid you.”
He jailed him for two years and 10 months, and banned him from driving for five years and five months.