A DRIVER who got drunk after wrongly believing he had terminal lung cancer has been jailed for three years for causing a mother’s death.

Christopher Fenn, also banned from driving for five years, was told by a judge at Maidstone Crown Court that it was the least sentence he could pass.

The 49-year-old engineer was considered to be almost three times over the legal limit when his F-registration Jaguar Sovereign smashed into Vanessa Baker’s car.

The court heard how Fenn drove over a railway crossing so fast that the front wheels lifted off the road.

Nicholas Wood, prosecuting, said Fenn overtook another car before losing control and crashing into Mrs Baker’s Ford Focus head-on in Grain Road, Grain, near Rochester, on April 17. The Focus was lifted by the impact and ended up on its side in a ditch.

Mr Wood said Fenn got out of his car on the single carriageway, put his hands on his head and said “Oh God” and “Help. It’s my fault.”

He went to the ditch with another man and tried to open the passenger door. “Mrs Baker was still strapped in her seatbelt, not moving or saying anything,” said Mr Wood.

“The emergency services arrived and by then she had died from multiple injuries. There is no suggestion she was at fault at all.”

The mother of five children aged between six and 24, who lived in Marlborough Road, Gillingham, had just dropped her husband Steve at work when the tragedy happened.

When police spoke to Fenn he smelt strongly of alcohol. “I did it,” he admitted. “It was all my fault.”

Mr Wood said divorced Fenn was taken to hospital complaining of chest pains and was not given a blood test until almost seven hours later. He claimed he had drunk four pints of bitter that afternoon, but the prosecutor said that could not be correct. Back calculations, he said, put him at just under two and three quarters over the legal limit.

Mr Wood said he did not propose to read a statement from Mr Baker “for obvious reasons”, but said it was best summed up by his comment: “Our life fell apart when the accident occurred.”

Fenn, of Sheldrake Close, Grain, admitted causing death by careless driving while unfit through drink. He had no recent convictions but was banned for a year in 1974 for drink-driving.

Andrew Lewis, defending, referred Judge Keith Simpson to guidelines by the sentencing advisory panel.

“I don’t know why we need one,” he said. “I would have thought the Court of Appeal quite capable of making up its own mind.”

Mr Lewis said Fenn sought no sympathy for himself and all his feelings were for the Baker family, some of whom were in court.

“He can’t find words to express his regret and sorrow,” said Mr Lewis. “I don’t know either. I would very much like them to know we have tried.”

Fenn, he said, had before the accident been coughing up blood and doctors told him it was likely to be lung cancer. When released from hospital he believed he was terminally ill.

Mr Lewis said on the day of the crash Fenn tried to lift his spirits by going out with a girlfriend. “It is painfully clear he drank a great deal more than he could capably take or remember afterwards,” he said.

“He took her home and drove towards his own home, clearly under the influence of far, far more drink than he normally would take, in a state he would not under normal circumstances ever of dream of driving a car.

“The purpose of that day was to take his mind off the reality of the situation. In that dangerous frame of mind, facing up to what he thought was imminent death, he drank and he drove.”

He later discovered that it was not cancer and could be a form of tuberculosis. Mr Lewis added: “He never escapes for a minute what he has done to Mrs Baker and her family.”

Judge Simpson told bearded Fenn: “Nothing I can say or do can restore Vanessa Baker to her family. This was a dreadful blow to the whole family. This is the tragedy of this sort of case.

“Nothing the court can say or do can assuage the pain felt by the family. You have faced up to things and pleaded guilty. You didn’t try to bluff your way out of it in any shape or form.

“I don’t see how you could, having driven the other vehicle off the road and into a ditch. I take into account that at the time you had the real worry you were suffering from lung cancer.

“That would have weighed heavily upon you but it was no excuse for filling yourself up with drink and driving in this dreadful way.”

The judge said he believed Fenn’s remorse was genuine and he would go on remembering the day of the crash for a long time.

“I have to take into account that so will Mr Baker and his children,” he said. “I bear in mind the sentencing advisory panel. They are the guidelines. The court has to take its own decision. The very least sentence I can pass is three years.”