Drink driver 'ran over' Axminster woman who tried to stop him

Written by the Herald court reporter.

Luke Geard had been drinking for five hours before he ran over the 57-year-old victim who had left her home in Axminster after hearing shouting in the street outside.

He was driving a powerful BMW X5 4x4 after dropping off a friend in Sector Lane when he came across a VW Golf going the other way.

There was shouting between the two drivers before the Golf driver backed into a gateway and Geard drove forwards, hitting a parked car as he tried to get through the gap.

Worried resident Helen Thorne had gone out to see what was going on and stood in front of Geard’s BMW to get him to stop. He drove at her and left her with appalling injuries on the road.

Geard then drove off and hit two more cars as he took B roads as he went to Seaton to buy a kebab before driving back to his home in Kilmington, where he was arrested.

On his way, he stopped at the scene of one of his earlier crashes and told the other driver she had ‘f***ed his Porsche wheels’, Exeter Crown Court was told.

When police told him of Mrs Thorne’s injuries he laughed and said: “That’s not my problem, I can’t give a f***’.

Geard, aged 31, of Hill Crest, Kilmington, denied causing grievous bodily harm with intent to do so. He says he was so drunk that he did not see Mrs Thorne.

The jury have been told that he has admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving.

Mr Herc Ashworth, prosecuting, said Geard had been drinking cider and lager in the George Hotel and Red Lion pubs in Axminster since around 5 pm and had an argument with his girlfriend during the evening.

He dropped off another female friend who had been drinking with at her home near Sector Lane at around 10 pm on June 22, 2022. His friend said she had to ask him to slow down because he was driving fast while telling her about how quick his car was.

Mrs Thorne, her daughter and her daughter’s boyfriend all left their home in Sector Lane after hearing an argument between drivers outside. She stood in front of his car to tell him to stop after he her daughter’s boyfriend’s car, which was also a BMW, and was parked in the lane.

Mr Ashworth said: “Helen Thorne walked across the front of the X5 so she was facing the defendant and was in front of the car and looking straight at him. She put her hands up to gesture to him to stop and not to move.

“She started to head back towards her daughter and at that point Geard accelerated heavily and she shouted for him to stop. Her daughter’s partner tried to pull her out of the way but was unsuccessful and the defendant drove into her.

“The X5 forced her up against a parked car and continued to accelerate, crushing her between the two cars and by the time his car passed, she had been thrown into the air and landed on her back on the other side of the parked car.”

She was left in terrible pain with both legs seriously injured and had to be moved to intensive care at Derriford Hospital, Plymouth, where she remained for two and a half weeks before being returned to the RD and E for further treatment and rehabilitation.

Mr Ashworth said Geard was aggressive or abusive with other drivers during his trip to and from Seaton, where he bought a kebab, and laughed when police told him of Mrs Thorne’s injuries.

He initially claimed his girlfriend had been driving but his defence is now that he did not see Mrs Thorne in the road and had not driven at her deliberately.

Mrs Thorne was video-interviewed while in hospital in Exeter. She said: “He looked straight at me and put his foot down and hit me into my daughter’s car. I felt like I went around in a circle and came out the other side.

“He didn’t stop. I remember lying there and my daughter telling me not to go to sleep and to open my eyes. I just assumed he was going to stop but he kept coming. It happened so quickly.

“There is no way he could not have seen me. It could not have been an accident. If it was, he would have braked and tried to go around me. He would have stopped, surely.”