Killer driver told not to drive by two OOs

A pensioner who killed a three-year-old girl despite being told to stop driving by two different optometrists has been jailed for four years.

John Place, 72, hit Poppy-Arabella Clarke and her mother Rachel at a pelican crossing in Sutton Coldfield. He admitted charges of causing death and serious injury by dangerous driving at Birmingham Crown Court earlier this month.

Place, who was not wearing his glasses and only stopped when flagged down by another driver, had been told his eyesight was so poor that he should not drive even while wearing glasses.

Sentencing, Judge Simon Drew QC said: ‘It was the middle of the day when you were driving in a residential area approaching a residential crossing. The lights were on red and vehicles driving in the opposite direction had stopped. You did not. The fact is that you appeared to be wholly unaware that the lights were on red, or that people were crossing the road.’