Dad of teen drink drive victim campaigns for lifelong bans

Nov 03, 2024 12:10

A grieving dad has used an appearance on Question Time as a springboard to call for lifelong bans for drink drivers who cause fatal crashes.

Scott Webb’s son Aidan, 19, died when Tyler Wilkins, 20, crashed his car while one and a half times over the limit in December 2022.

In September, Wilkins, of Milton Keynes, Bucks., was jailed for three and a half years and handed a seven-year driving ban for the fatal crash.

Scott used a recent appearance on the BBC show to raise the issue and has since started a petition calling for lifelong bans for drink drivers who kill.

It has garnered more than 19,000 signatures in a matter of weeks.

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“Our main aim is to introduce a law that means drivers that kill while over the limit are banned for life,” Scott, 52, of Milton Keynes, said.

“I don’t think the law is enough to prevent people at the moment.

“When Aidan’s killer comes out he will be allowed to drive again in just a few years. That doesn’t seem right to me.”

Aidan was a passenger on the way home from watching England in the Euros when Wilkins crashed his Vauxhall Corsa.

In addition to being over the limit, several defects were also found on Wilkins’ car, including a bald tyre and faulty brakes.

He later pleaded guilty to causing death by careless driving.

Aylesbury Crown Court heard how Aidan died at the scene and three other passengers, all aged in their late teens, were taken to hospital with minor injuries.

Reflecting on the tragedy, Scott said: ‘I just wish I had never let him out that night.

‘My last words to him were ‘have a good night, don’t let anyone drink or drive. If I could turn the clock back and take his place I would do it in a heartbeat.’

Since the tragedy, Scott has been determined that something good can come out of it.

He added: ‘The main thing being we want to stop other families going through what we have gone through.

‘This has had such a massive impact on us. It has taken us this long to get back to somewhere we can do something like this.

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‘We will never be the same again. We will never be the same people. I lost part of my life that day that will never come back.

‘I am just not the same person.

‘I tell anyone who thinks about drink driving to think about a loved one, where you have to go and see them and you can not see their full face – that is what families have to go through and what we saw in hospital the next day and the chapel of rest will haunt me forever.’

Scott said the family considers Watkins’ sentence ‘far too lenient’ and said he can never forgive him.

He said: ‘We never received an apology or letter from him. His step dad and mum wrote us a letter but we have not read that either.

‘It won’t help me in any way.’

Aidan had been on a gap year and was planning to go to university to study cyber security.

Scott is being supported in the campaign by wife Angela Webb, 48, and son Lewis, 17.

He felt his question on Question Time didn’t get answered properly and was told after the show that his thoughts would be passed on to the Ministry of Justice.

Scott says he has not heard anything back since them.

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Dad of teen drink drive victim campaigns for lifelong bans