Collision in the early hours of New Year’s Day which resulted in the death of Jamie Murray. After the collision, the driver, 24 year old Luke Headech from Bexhill, continued for a quarter of a mile before all four occupants abandoned the car.
All four were initially arrested on suspicion of a number of offences; three were released, but Headech faced a string of charges. He pleaded guilty to attempting to pervert the course of justice (after claiming that his car had been stolen, leading to a man being arrested and then released) and failing to stop at the scene of an accident, but denied the other charges and was tried at Lewes Crown Court in May 2016. During the trial he changed his plea for causing death by dangerous driving to guilty, and was found guilty of being over the prescribed limit of alcohol in a Newton hearing.
He was sentenced to six years and three months for causing death by dangerous driving and nine months for perverting the course of justice, to run consecutively. He was also banned from driving for five years and required to take an extended retest.
Headech appealed the sentence and in March 2017 the Court of Appeal ruled that his driving ban would not commence at the time of his release, as originally given, but at the time of his conviction. Judge Sir John Saunders noted that the original sentence need to be changed because at the time of the offence the law had not been changed to allow driving bans to commence after rehearsal from jail.