Drugged driver jailed 12 years for girlfriend's death in crash

A driver banned from the roads and under the influence of multiple drugs was jailed for more than 12 years after causing the death of his girlfriend in a high-speed crash on a northeastern England motorway. Kane Farragher, 24, from Birkenhead but of no fixed address, admitted causing the death by dangerous driving of Taylor Jenkins, 24, from Edinburgh, who was in the front passenger seat of the BMW he was driving when it collided head-on with a taxi on the A19 near Sunderland in the early hours of March 1.

Newcastle Crown Court heard that Farragher had been traveling with Ms. Jenkins and a male friend in the back seat after attending an event in Newcastle. The BMW triggered an automatic number plate recognition camera on Tyneside, flagging it as a vehicle of interest to Police Scotland. Northumbria Police officers attempted to stop the car on the Felling bypass in Gateshead, but Farragher accelerated into a coned-off section of the carriageway, reaching speeds of up to 136 mph to evade them.

The pursuit was abandoned when Farragher drove southbound on the northbound carriageway of the A19. About one mile into the wrong lane and seven miles from where officers first tried to stop...