'Arrogant' Selby crash driver gets five years in jail

A motorist who caused the death of 10 people in the Selby rail disaster by falling asleep at the wheel was sent to jail for five years yesterday by a judge who said there was little to chose between his actions and those of a drink driver.

Mr Judge Mackay told 37-year-old Gary Hart that his persistent failure to admit responsibility, reflected in a recent psychologist's report that he remained "shocked and angry" by his conviction last month, did nothing to help him.

He told the 37-year-old that his "arrogant" claim that he was "not like other people" and could function on no sleep had been "rudely disproved" by the disaster and the jury that subsequently convicted him on 10 counts of causing death by dangerous driving.

Hart set off on a 145-mile journey from his home in Strubby, Lincolnshire, to work at Wigan, Lancashire, after having no sleep on 28 February last year, having chatted deep into the night to a woman he had met though an internet dating agency. He fell asleep and his vehicle drifted off the M62 near Selby, coming to rest across the east coat main line, causing the railway crash.

"In moral terms ... I see very little to chose between a driver who sets off on a journey affected by drink with [the risk that he will] fail to control his vehicle and a driver who sets off in your condition with the risk that he will lose complete control at some stage," the judge told Hart.

Hart, whose hands remained clasped throughout the hour-long court proceedings, was impassive as he was told that he would not be considered for parole until mid-2005. He took a lingering look at his 39-year-old wife Elaine, with whom he was recently reunited, before leaving the dock at Leeds Crown Court.

Hart's counsel, Edmund Lawson QC, had implored the judge not to penalise him for the bizarre chain of events that technically left Hart responsible for 10 deaths. Hart, who had not been drinking and had not stayed at the scene, should be principally judged by his conduct, he said.

But Mr Justice Mackay insisted that the unforeseen consequences were "a fact of life that the court must live up to". Hart had no "understandable" reasons for finding himself driving on no sleep as some motorists had, such as a particularly hard day's work. Instead, he embarked on his second trans-Pennine journey in 24 hours, in the dark and bad weather, heaving a two-ton load along a monotonous motorway.

Superintendent Nick Bracken, of British Transport Police, said Hart had ignored the warnings of sleepiness and continued his journey to Wigan.

The form the inevitable accident took was "largely a matter of how the dice fell," said Mr Justice Mackay.

"Every driver, and I include myself, has been in or very nearly in that position in their lives," the judge added. "Most, fortunately, acknowledge it by taking a break, taking a sleep or handing over to someone else. A driver who presses on as you did, fighting the body's warnings, takes a grave risk."

The judge, who had received a "moving" letter in mitigation from Hart's wife and testimonies from his workmates, added: "I accept you will live with the consequences ... for the rest of your life but so, to a much greater extent, will the relatives of those 10 men who died and the survivors."

Almost inevitably, no survivors of the crash supported the verdict. Andy Hill, 40, of Doncaster, South Yorkshire, the driver of a freight train involved in the crash, said: "I am not very happy. I thought he ought to have got at least 10 years. I realise it may have been reduced on appeal, but it should have been longer."

Detective Superintendent Peter McKay, of North Yorkshire Police, said: "There are some people standing behind me today who do not think it [the sentence] is long enough."