Mark Fensome hit 10-year-old Lily Morris with his car (Picture: MEN Media/Greater Manchester Police)
A drunk driver who ran over two children and drove away without helping them has been jailed.
Mark Fensome, 43, had been out drinking with work colleagues before running over 10-year-old Lily Morris and her 12-year-old friend as they walked to the local chippy on December 18, 2021.
Lily died in hospital just days before Christmas while her friend was also severely injured.
Fensome was one-and-a-half times over the drink-drive limit when he got into his Land Rover shortly before 5pm. Dashcam footage caught him driving ‘aggressively and erratically’ through Oldham, Greater Manchester, moments before the crash.
He braked heavily before turning into Coleridge Road – a residential street with speed bumps and a 20mph limit – where he kept driving dangerously.
Fensome then failed to take a left-hand bend at speed and mounted the kerb on the wrong side of the street, where Lily and her friend were walking.
Both girls were hit by the car, which then smashed into a lamppost so hard it was pulled out of the ground.
Lily was thrown onto the bonnet of the car and hit the windscreen before falling to the ground.
Passers-by tried to help Lily Morris but she died in hospital after the crash (Picture: MEN Media)
The crash also ripped a lamppost out of the ground (Picture: MEN Media)
Fensome got out of the car and looked around at the carnage before driving away – with part of the lamp post still stuck underneath his car.
Members of the public rushed to help the girls and performed first aid on Lily. She was taken to hospital but died after suffering head, neck and chest injuries.
The girl’s friend also suffered serious head injuries. She spent three days in hospital.
After arriving at his home nearby, Fensome began assessing the damage to his car. He was confronted by a witness who told him he had ‘killed a child’ and punched him.
A ‘clearly intoxicated’ Fensome was arrested minutes later and was said to have been unsteady on his feet and smelling of alcohol.
He told police he did not realise that he had hit anyone. The court heard that Fensome had traces of cannabis and amphetamine in his blood.
The Land Rover’s two front tyres were below the legal minimum tread depth, although there was no evidence the defects had contributed towards the collision.
Mark Fensome has now been jailed (Picture: Greater Manchester Police)
Fensome, of Diggle Street, Shaw, has 10 previous convictions for 16 offences, including several for driving.
He appeared at Manchester Minshull Street crown court on Friday, having previously pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving.
Ian Bridge, mitigating, told the court that Fensome had gone through a ‘difficult young life’ but had working consistently for more than ten years and had managed to stay out of trouble. He said the defendant was ‘full of remorse’ for what had happened.
‘As far as he is concerned, you can throw the key away,’ Mr Bridge said. ‘He can’t live with himself.’
Mr Bridge said Fensome had ‘contemplated suicide’ and found it ‘extremely difficult to live with what he has done’.
More: Trending
He added: ‘His position is that he will go to prison for a long, long time and, in his current state of mind, he doesn’t think he will emerge.
‘He is destroyed by what he has done. He does not understand it.’
Judge Tina Landale jailed Fensome for nine years and told him he had ‘deprived’ Lily and her family ‘of her life and her future’.
‘You were severely impaired by the alcohol,’ she added. ‘If you had not been you would have realised you had hit the children.’
Fensome was also disqualified from driving for 12 years and six months and ordered to take an extended retest before returning to the road.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
For more stories like this, check our news page.
‘You were severely impaired by the alcohol. If you had not been you would have realised you had hit the children.’