Driver who killed two young brothers while speeding and high on drugs has jail sentence increased

A driver who killed two young brothers while speeding and high on drugs has had his jail sentence increased.

Robert Brown was banned from driving, travelling at more than twice the speed limit and had taken a cocktail of drugs when he mowed down Corey and Casper Platt-May, aged six and two.

The Court of Appeal has now increased the 53-year-old’s original nine-year jail term to 10-and-a-half years.

The boys were on their way to a park with their mother Louise Platt-May when they were struck by Brown’s Ford Focus as they crossed MacDonald Road, Coventry, in February.

Mrs Platt-May called for the Government to introduce stiffer penalties for ‘drivers who think they are above the law’ after Brown was jailed at Warwick Crown Court in April.

Their father Reece Platt-May was found dead while on holiday in Greece in May.

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Solicitor General Robert Buckland argued at a hearing earlier in July that Brown’s sentence was ‘unduly lenient’.

He asked Court of Appeal judges to consider whether the serial offender should have received two consecutive sentences – one for causing each boy’s death.

Sir Brian Leveson, sitting with two other judges, said the case justified a term ‘at the very top of the sentencing range’.

He said: ‘It does not need this court to underline that the impact of these offences has been truly catastrophic on the family of these two boys.

‘We have read the victim personal statements provided by their mother and eight-year-old brother and recognise that no sentence which the court can impose will ever make up for the loss that they have suffered.’

Brown, of Attwood Crescent in Wyken, Warwickshire, had never had a driving licence in his life and was banned from driving at the time of the crash.

He had taken cocaine, diazepam and zopiclone and was driving his Ford Focus at more than 60mph in a 30mph zone on February 22 when he ploughed into the brothers.

Despite efforts to save them, they died in hospital a short while later.

Brown, who fled the scene, had 30 previous convictions for driving offences and was only released from prison six days before the crash after serving half of a six-month sentence for having an offensive weapon.

His passenger at the time of the crash, Gwendoline Harrison, 42, of Triumph Close, Wyken, was jailed for six months after admitting assault intending to resist arrest and attempting to flee the scene.

In a statement released by her lawyers Irwin Mitchell after Brown was jailed, Mrs Platt-May said he had shown a ‘total disregard for the law’.

She added: ‘Because of him we are living a life sentence knowing we will never see our boys grow up, whilst he will be out of prison in just a few years and will be free to continue his life.

‘We will never come to terms with how Corey and Casper were taken far too soon.

‘Our only hope now is that some good comes out of their deaths through the introduction of tougher punishments for drivers who think they are above the law.’