Moment teen e-bike rider high on cannabis knocked down and killed 86-year-old grandmother after colliding with her at zebra crossing while on his phone
This is the moment a teenager riding a defective e-bike while high on cannabis knocked down and killed an 86-year-old woman on a zebra crossing.
Billy Stokoe was jailed for six years and nine months for causing the death of Gloria Stephenson who had been taking her daily 10,000 steps as she walked her daughter’s dog.
On May 16 last year, the teenager had ridden for half a mile with the left-side brake on his Sur-Ron e-bike broken and his mobile phone in his left hand, Newcastle Crown Court heard.
Dashcam footage from the scene shows Stokoe collide with Mrs Stephenson then fall from his bike. With a callous disregard for her plight, he retrieved the bike and rode back to look down at Mrs Stephenson before speeding off to hide the machine at his friend’s home.
The footage shows the pensioner lying motionless on the ground, with her daughter’s small dog leaping around in distress.
Stokoe was driven by his mother to the police station just over an hour later to hand himself in. The judge explained Stokoe, 19, would spend half of his sentence in custody – a total of three years and four months.
Mrs Stephenson’s family were incensed by Stokoe’s behaviour during bail, when he applied to change his conditions so he could watch Sunderland play at Wembley, tried to go on holiday and had been looking for Halloween party tickets on social media.
Mrs Stephenson’s daughter, Lisa Tench, told the court: ‘I will never be able to forget the image of my mother lying bruised and battered in the road, her right leg amputated below the knee, hanging onto her leg by a thread.
‘It is an image that will haunt me until the day that I die, every time I pass that crossing and I relive it in my nightmares.
‘She tried so hard to breathe. I begged her not to leave me. She tried with tears running down her cheeks but her body had suffered too much trauma and she could not fight the injuries you caused her.’
Billy Stokoe, 19, killed 86-year-old Gloria Stephenson when he ploughed into her on his e-bike at a zebra crossing
Stokoe paced up and down the road with his hands to his head after going back to look at Mrs Stephenson lying on the road before fleeing the scene as bystanders rushed to help his victim
Gloria Stephenson was out walking her daughter’s dog and trying to reach her daily 10,000 steps
Stokoe has been jailed for six years and nine months, avoiding the maximum 18 years
Just 10 days after his arrest Stokoe asked police whether he could vary his bail conditions to allow him to go to watch Sunderland in last year’s Championship play-off final at Wembley.
He made a similar request about a foreign family holiday that had already been paid for.
Sentencing today, Judge Robert Adams said Mrs Stephenson was a vulnerable road user on a pedestrian crossing who had waited for traffic to stop for her and the dog.
Mrs Stephenson’s family said they were ‘incandescent with rage’ after learning Stokoe will spend less than three and a half years in jail.
After the hearing, Julie Francis, the eldest daughter of retired hospital manager Mrs Stephenson, said: ‘It is absolutely disgusting and we are incandescent with rage.
‘How can it possibly be justice when he will serve three years in prison for taking the life of our mother? It’s appalling.
‘The judge said that he felt Stokoe had shown remorse but we know differently. He applied for a change to his bail days after he killed our mother so that he could go to Wembley to watch Sunderland.
‘He was posting messages on social media looking for tickets to a Halloween party. That shows no remorse or thought for our mother or our family.
‘We simply can’t believe what has happened here today, it is dreadful.’
On the day of the accident, Stokoe’s judgement was impaired by the cannabis he had been smoking and he was unable to brake on the unroadworthy Sur-Ron e-bike he had bought from a friend who advertised it for sale on Facebook.
The bike only had a working back brake, operated by the left brake lever which Stokoe could not use because he had his phone in his hand and was looking at it when he ploughed into Mrs Stephenson.
He didn’t see her until he had hit her, making no attempt to take evasive action ahead of the crossing on Burdon Road, Sunderland, Tyne and Wear, in bright daylight at 1pm.
Mrs Stephenson, who suffered multiple broken bones and a torn heart wall, had gone out in her trainers, collecting her daughter’s dog as she went for her daily walk.
In a harrowing statement to the court, Mrs Tench told of the sight that greeted her when she was called to the scene by a friend who had recognised her mother.
Addressing her comment to Stokoe, she said: ‘You hit her with such force that you catapulted her feet from the crossing and then you drove away and left her there to die.
Stokoe had been riding around with his mobile phone in his left hand for half a mile before he ploughed into Mrs Stephenson
Stokoe sobbed after his mother drove him to the police station to hand himself in
Stokoe arriving at court today to learn his sentence, which was reduced because the judge considered he had shown remorse
Stokoe, who has an IQ of just 66, has suffered flashbacks and been unable to sleep since he killed the 86-year-old, the court heard
‘You have no moral compass. You are not a victim of your circumstances, you are a victim of your own behaviour. I will hate you until my last breath.’
Judge Adams could have sentenced Stokoe to a maximum of 18 years, but reduced the sentence because he had shown remorse and handed himself in to the police an hour and a quarter after the crash. The sentence was further reduced by a quarter for his guilty pleas.
Judge Adams said: ‘The defendant did not set out to cause harm to anybody but his criminal actions in riding as he did caused Mrs Stephenson’s death. It is clear her family are suffering terribly and are very angry.
‘The defendant will have to live with what he has done for the rest of his life. Inevitably some will feel that the sentence I pass today will be too short, but he is not being sentenced for murder or manslaughter, he did not set out to harm anyone.’
He said it was clear to him that Stokoe had shown remorse from a letter he wrote to the court and from his actions at the scene of the accident when he was tearful and repeating ‘I am sorry, I am sorry, I am sorry.’
The Sur-Ron bike was defective, with the front brake missing entirely and many of its functions disabled.
An examiner said: ‘It would have been clear to a careful and competent rider that the vehicle was not safe to be used on a road.’
Judge Adams said the phone in his hand ‘was not a momentary distraction’ and that Stokoe had it in his hand for half a mile.
He said: ‘He never saw Mrs Stephenson, so distracted was he by the phone he was carrying. He used it and was distracted by it for a relatively long period.
‘It was obviously a highly dangerous manoeuvre to use the phone when it meant he had no means of stopping the bike by braking.
‘It is difficult to determine the level of impairment from the use of drink or drugs, but this impairment was an aggravating factor.’
He also banned Stokoe from driving for eight years and four months, at which point he will have to sit an extended driving test.
Helen Towers, for Stokoe, said he suffered from ADHD, which he self-medicated by smoking cannabis.
The apprentice bricklayer had been forced to stop the course he had been undertaking as a result of the action against him.
Stokoe, she said, had suffered a difficult family background and was so remorseful about killing Mrs Stephenson that he had formed a ‘suicidal ideation’ as a result.
He had an IQ of just 66 and had suffered flashbacks and been unable to sleep since the incident, she said.
Ms Towers read out a statement from Stokoe, who wept at various points throughout the hearing, which read: ‘I will forever be sorry and I do not ever expect to be forgiven. I wish more than anything I could change it all. I cannot believe the pain I have brought to the lady’s family and to my own.’
Stokoe pleaded guilty in February to causing the death of Mrs Stephenson by dangerous driving while unlicenced and uninsured and under the influence of cannabis.
