A TAXI passenger was killed after frantically trying to wake the driver, who had fallen asleep, moments before a fatal crash in Swindon.

Kenneth Riddett, 44, leaned forward to try and rouse driver Shehzad Akbar, so when the car smashed into a tree on the Oxford Road he was not wearing a seatbelt.

Despite being cut free from the mangled wreckage, Mr Riddett was able to tell police what happened before dying in hospital four days later due to massive internal injuries.

At Swindon Crown Court, Akbar, 33, was sentenced in his absence as it is believed he had fled to his native Pakistan to avoid the inevitable jail term.

Rosie Collins, prosecuting, told a judge how the accident happened on Sunday, October 19 last year.

She said Mr Riddett was picked up from his home in Southcote, Reading, to go to Swindon town centre where he worked as a train controller for First Great Western.

As the car was heading along Queens Drive close to the junction with Whitbourne Avenue. the passenger noticed the driver dozing off and tried to rouse him.

But the Honda Accord clipped the nearside kerb before crossing all three carriageways, crashing through a set of traffic lights and smashing head on into a tree.

Although the roof had to be cut off to free, Mr Riddett he appeared to have escaped serious injury and told a paramedic about what happened on the short journey to hospital. He said ‘I saw the driver fall asleep. His head nodded forward. We were drifting off the road.

“I shouted at him to wake him but he didn’t. Then we crashed into a traffic sign and tree’.

And he told a police officer: “He fell asleep. We started to veer off the road. I shouted ‘oh, oh, oh’. We struck the tree and the driver started shouting.”

At hospital he was found to have suffered massive internal injuries and despite their best efforts doctors could not save him.

The judge, Recorder Ian Lawrie, told the court that as the seatbelt locked when Mr Riddett was leaning forward he effectively became an ‘unrestrained passenger’.

“He was wearing a seatbelt but leaned forward to try and wake the somnolent Mr Akbar. Then there was the ricochet effect of two collisions.

“Because of trying to wake Mr Akbar he put himself in a position of enhanced risk causing these injuries.”

Miss Collins told the court that Akbar was in the UK on a student visa and was studying for a master’s degree in business studies at the University of Buckingham and working part-time as a taxi driver.

She said the accident came at the end of a 14-hour shift during which he had 15 pick ups and on the third consecutive night shift.

Akbar, of Granby Gardens, Reading, Berkshire, had initially pleaded not guilty to a charge of causing death by dangerous driving but before a jury could be sworn in on the first morning of his trial he changed his plea to guilty.

Andrew Cohen, defending, said although he had failed to turn up to face sentence his client, who is married with a young child, was full of remorse for what he had done.

He said he was in the UK studying trying to better himself and supplementing money sent from home by working as a taxi driver.

Imposing a two year nine month jail term, the judge said “Mr Riddett would not have been put into that dangerous situation had Mr Akbar not fallen asleep.”

He also banned him from driving for five years and said he must pass an extended driving test before he could get a licence.

Any punishment for failing to attend would be dealt with when he is brought before the court for the sentence to be activated.