Ex-cop jailed over crash

A former policeman was jailed for six and a half years after killing a grandmother during a 100mph "hair-raising joyride".

Malcolm Searles, 24, was delivering an 18th birthday card to his sister when his car hit Sandra Simpson, 61, in August last year.

Driving in a marked patrol car with his blue lights flashing and siren sounding, he repeatedly broke the speed limit. At one point his on-board computer recorded him doing 104mph in a 40mph zone while treating his father and uncle to a display of his high-speed driving skills, Southwark Crown Court heard.

Finally, after a "prolonged course of dangerous driving lasting over an hour", he hit Mrs Simpson, a mother of three, while travelling at 56mph in a 30mph zone in Bromley, south-east London. She later died of chest and head injuries

Michael Mulkerris, prosecuting, said: "Had he been driving at the legal limit he would have been able to stop."

Searles, from Swanley, Kent, later claimed he had been following a speeding car he believed had been stolen. He pleaded guilty at an earlier Southwark Crown Court hearing to one count of causing death by dangerous driving, one count of dangerous driving, and two counts of speeding on August 23 last year.