Reckless driver who is so blind his licence was revoked is jailed for hitting and killing retired rugby player outside pub car park
A reckless driver who struck and killed an ex-rugby player despite having had his licence revoked due to his poor eyesight has been jailed.
A reckless driver who struck and killed an ex-rugby player despite having had his licence revoked due to his poor eyesight has been jailed.
Retired teacher John Bird got behind the wheel despite having his licence revoked up to seven years previously.
He struck down pensioner Keith McCann in Swalecliffe, Kent, shortly before Christmas 2022.
Bird lacked peripheral vision and smashed into ex-rugby player Mr McCann, 75, he was walking across the entrance to a pub car park.
The much-loved grandfather, from Whitstable, Kent, was left in a vegetative state after falling back and hitting his head, before dying less than a year after the accident.
Retired teacher John Bird admitted to causing death by dangerous driving after he killed an ex-rugby player while behind the wheel, despite having had his licence revoked due to his poor eyesight
Bird, whose licence was revoked in 2015, admitted causing death by dangerous driving. A judge branded him an accident waiting to happen as he jailed him for three years at Canterbury Crown Court.
The court heard Bird had was on his way to buy a newspaper when he turned right into the entrance of The Wheatsheaf pub in Swalecliffe, Kent.
However, lacking peripheral vision due to his poor eyesight, he failed to see Mr McCann, who was walking across the entrance.
Having been struck by the drivers side of the car, Mr McCann, who lived with his wife in Whitstable and had worked for Customs and Excise up until his retirement, fell and hit the back of his head on the tarmac surface.
The physically fit father-of-two suffered irreversible brain damage as well as fractures to his skull and left ankle and was left in a vegetative state following the collision on December 10.
Having lived what his son described as his fathers own worst nightmare, Mr McCann sadly died just under a year later at the Willow Park Lodge care home in Dover, Kent.
Bird, also from Whitstable, had stopped at the time of the collision and called an ambulance for the stricken victim.
Despite his diabetes diagnosis and subsequent treatment for both glaucoma and cataracts, he later told police his visibility was good and he could not understand why he hadnt seen the pedestrian.
Bird, who spent much of his 40-year teaching career at Stockport Grammar School in Greater Manchester, initially admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving.
Upon Mr McCanns death, he was recharged and admitted causing death by dangerous driving.
Prosecutor Don Ramble said Bird had waited to allow oncoming traffic to pass before driving into Mr McCann, who was almost halfway across the entrance.
He explained the victim had spent time in Kings College Hospital in London before being transferred to Ashfords William Harvey Hospital, then ultimately moved into the care home in November last year.
The court heard heartbreaking statements from Mr McCanns family, who said in the year leading to his death, he could not speak, move, smile, or even recognise his wife, Susan, who hed been married to for 53 years.
He continued to deteriorate despite regular physiotherapy and rehabilitation, and never regained capacity to care for himself, Mr Ramble said.
The ex-teacher knocked down Keith McCann outside The Wheatsheaf pub in Whitstable, Kent
Mr McCann was eventually moved onto an end-of-life care plan and died from what a pathologist concluded to be sepsis and head injury.
Mr Ramble continued: Prior to the collision he was retired and engaged in all acts of daily living.
He did not require any assistance, was fit and healthy, and used to walk three or four miles every day.
He was an ex-rugby player and ran marathons until the age of 65.
Referring to medical reports, Mr Ramble added: There is absolutely no doubt [Mr McCann] died as a direct result of the head injury he sustained the year before.
Following his arrest at the scene of the collision, Bird revealed that despite his licence being revoked in 2015, he had continued to drive two or three times a month, including to take his then-ailing father to medical appointments.
Checks revealed Bird had advised the DVLA in August 1994 of his diabetes diagnosis and of his glaucoma diagnosis in 2004, which was treated with eye drops.
The court heard he later had cataract surgery, but although it corrected his left eye, his right eye continued to be treated with drops.
Bird also required glasses for his long-distance vision, which he was wearing at the time of the collision.
Due to his eyesight condition, he had been required to undergo medical reviews every three years to renew his licence, which was revoked in April 2015.
Mr Ramble said: He said he knew his driving licence had been revoked, that he had not been contacted by DVLA to reinstate his licence and that it was against the law to drive without a valid licence.
Asked why he was driving when his licence was revoked, he said he did not want to answer that question and could not understand why he had not seen Mr McCann.
In a statement read out to the court, Mr McCanns widow described how she had met her husband when they were both working in the wages department at Chatham Dockyard.
One of the couples children had married just six weeks prior to the accident, and they had four grandchildren.
However, reflecting on the day of their last wedding anniversary spent together at his hospital bedside, Mrs McCann revealed her husband didnt have any idea who she was.
She wrote how their lives together and plans to travel and buy a property abroad had been ripped away by Birds actions.
No punishment can make up for the heartache and pain, Mrs McCann said.
If [Bird] had obeyed the law and not driven his car that day, this tragic situation would never have happened and I would still have my Keith.
The couples daughter, Abby Gore, spoke of her anger and hate at losing her rock, strength and role model, whilst her brother, Mark McCann, said a man of impeccable morals had died as a result of the ex-teachers selfish and reckless behaviour.
My dad was never a frail old man, he said.
He prided himself on being active and healthy. He was left living his own worst nightmare through no fault of his own.
The court heard unmarried Bird, who had also previously worked for the NHS, moved to Kent from the northwest to help look after his parents.
With no previous convictions or cautions and a clean driving record until the collision, Bird was said to have lived a blameless life, teaching thousands of children and contributing positively to society.
John FitzGerald, defending, said the pensioner had shown profound and genuine remorse and wished to convey his shame and sorrow to Mr McCanns family.
This is a man who is genuinely sorry, doesnt seek to justify, and accepts responsibility for his actions, he told the court.
Why on earth has this man, leading the lifestyle he was and contributing to society in the way he has, made the decision to drive? He cant explain.
Bird was branded an accident waiting to happen by a judge at Canterbury Crown Court (pictured)
Jailing Bird for three years, Judge Simon James told him that though the maximum sentence for his charge was life imprisonment, his sentence had been reduced by the McCann familys wholly understandable decision to withdraw medical intervention.
[Mr McCanns] death was an undeniable tragedy and although you obviously didnt go out intent on causing such grief and loss, you had been regularly driving without a valid licence since 2015, Judge James said.
You were, as they say, an accident waiting to happen.
The catastrophic consequences of your deliberate and selfish decision to continue to drive when you had been informed you were unfit to do so safely, means that this offence cannot be properly described as a momentary lapse of judgement but must be considered not simply to be foreseeable but the almost inevitable consequence of a quite deliberate course of conduct.
Whilst it gives me no pleasure to send a man like you to prison, there is in my judgment a need to ensure that people are aware that if they make a conscious decision to ignore the law and tragic consequences result, the consequences will be dire.
Bird was handed a driving ban until further order.
