Crazed 90mph driver Sean Medland from Bexley put passenger Eleanor Cottrill in hospital after crash on Medway City Estate in Strood
Published: 10:00, 11 July 2014
A car passenger suffered serious injuries after a friend drove at up to 90mph on an industrial estate in wintry weather, a court heard.
Sean Medland lost control of his Ford Mondeo on Medway City Estate, in Strood, and crashed into a shop.
Backseat passenger Eleanor Cottrill was trapped in the car.
She was eventually taken to hospital and treated for a collapsed lung and two broken ribs and needed extensive physiotherapy.
Medland, 21, denied causing injury by dangerous driving, but was convicted.
Prosecutor Paul Tapsell said it had been snowing on February 22 last year, but it had not settled and the roads were not particularly icy.
"I said to him to slow down. It was snowing. When I looked at the speedo it said he was doing 90mph. I felt the car spin. Sean shouted. I felt us hit a tree..." - Eleanor Cottrill
Ali Aker was sitting in the front passenger seat and Miss Cottrill was behind her. Medland drove on the 30mph limit road at over 70mph and crashed into Medway City Laptops.
Miss Cottrill said they went to the estate to do a "Harlem Shake", the craze of dancing to music and putting it online, in a car park. After they left, Medland drove up and down the road.
"While going towards the roundabout he was going up in the gears," she told a jury at Maidstone Crown Court. "He shouted out he was doing 70mph. I was on my phone and not paying much attention.
"I said to him to slow down. It was snowing. When I looked at the speedo it said he was doing 90mph. I felt the car spin. Sean shouted. I felt us hit a tree.
"After that I must have passed out. The front end of the car was coming out of a building at a diagonal angle. I opened my eyes and saw all the wreckage around me.
"Ali was already out of the car. I couldn't get out. I had a seatbelt on. I was pulled out of the other side of the car because I couldn't get out of my side.
"I realised what just happened. I was driven to Medway hospital. I was in there for two days."
Miss Cottrill said that as well as a collapsed lung and broken ribs, she had extensive bruising and soft tissue damage.
"I had to take leave from college and work for eight weeks," she said. "It was right when my examinations were."
Medland, of Hurst Road, Bexley, will be sentenced on August 15.
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