A pub worker drove into another vehicle after spending the night drinking and taking drugs at a party. Larisa Jones had been speeding while giving a lift home to two friends on the morning of August 21 last year when her car struck another vehicle – injuring one of her passengers so seriously he spent weeks in an induced coma.
Yet in a letter read to Swansea Crown Court the victim, Billy Wathan, said he didn't wish to see his friend imprisoned. Prosecutor Dean Pulling told the court the 21-year-old had been working at the Castle Hotel in Pontardawe before joining friends at Kitty's in the town when she finished her shift. She had then headed to a house party with friends, including Mr Wathan, where she had taken cocaine. At 9am on August 21, having turned down an earlier request for a lift in her car she agreed to take Mr Wathan and another friend, Chloe McQuaide, home.
Despite wet driving conditions and a 30mph speed limit Jones drove her Renault Twingo at speed through Ynysmeudy before hitting a Citroen being driving "cautiously" by 50-year-old Andrea Wheelhouse. The Twingo then somersaulted into the air before colliding with a lamppost. Forensic investigations who examined CCTV footage from a property along the route estimated Jones had been driving at between 54 and 67mph.
