A teenage joyrider who led police on a “terrifying” high-speed chase for three miles through central London has been locked up for 16 months.
Ugur Akis ran five red lights and reached 80mph as he drove through Maida Vale, Kilburn and on Euston Road while more than twice the drink-drive limit, the Old Bailey heard. He swerved in and out of traffic in what a policeman said was “one of the most dangerous pieces of driving he has seen”.
Akis, then 19, of Edmonton, was pulled over by a police van in Maida Vale after being spotted undertaking in his friend’s Vauxhall Astra in September last year.
He drove off, going over speed humps at more than 40mph before being stopped by a traffic jam outside King’s Cross station, where he waved his provisional licence at officers and told them: “It couldn’t have been me driving because I can’t drive.”
Yesterday, he admitted dangerous driving, driving without a licence and insurance, drink driving, fraud and possessing a bogus credit card.
Sentencing him to 16 months in a young offenders’ institution, Judge Wendy Joseph QC said: “It’s terrifying to watch the way in which you drove.” Akis will also be banned from driving for two years and eight months.
MORE ABOUT