Chesterfield boy racer smashed head-on into driver while speeding at up to 73mph on a 30mph road

Mitchell Shannon, 20, was 19 when he ploughed into his victim’s car from the opposite direction as it turned right from 30mph zone North Wingfield Road into a side road.

A prosecutor told Derby Crown Court after the impact the victim had to climb out of his car window and had suffered a fractured pelvis.

He was left unable to return to his job as a tractor driver.

During the incident on June 29 last year an off-duty police officer was behind Shannon’s victim as he entered a lane to turn right.

“He saw the defendant approaching in the opposite direction,” said the prosecutor.

He added: "The assessment of the officer was that (the victim) would have had time to make the turn but the defendant’s car closed the distance very quickly.

"He was trying to avoid (the victim’s) vehicle but he collided with it almost head-on.”

The court heard Shannon was carrying a passenger at the time, who later told police the defendant had only just purchased the car and he was speeding to “try it out”.

Shannon, of Vernon Rise, Grassmoor, had no relevant previous convictions apart from drug offences as a youth, the court heard.

He admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving.

Judge Jonathan Straw told Shannon: “The reason that manoeuvre finished with him (the victim) having to be extracted from his car, having suffered a fractured pelvis which has left him mentally and physically affected, is because you were showing off to your mate in your car, driving at a speed somewhere between 63 and 72 miles per hour.

"It was grossly in excess of the limit and way beyond anything conceivably safe.”

However the judge noted Shannon had no previous driving convictions, adding that his immaturity was a mitigation and that there was a realistic prospect of rehabilitation.

Shannon was jailed for two years suspended for 18 months, handed 120 hours unpaid work, a five-month curfew and a two-year driving ban.