- Wednesday, April 24, 2024
By: Keerthi Mohan
A COMPANY director has been jailed for 18 months for causing the death of a girl nine years after an accident he was involved in left her disabled.
Cerys Edwards was 11 months old in 2006 when Antonio Boparan, then 19, crashed head-on into her parents’ car.
The accident left her paralysed, needing round-the-clock specialist care.
Cerys died in October 2015 and her death was “a consequence of her spinal cord injury and traumatic brain injury sustained in collision”, Birmingham Crown Court heard on Thursday (7).
Boparan is the son of Ranjit Singh Boparan, the founder of 2 Sisters Food Group.
Following a trial in 2008, 32-year-old Antonio served six months of a 21-month sentence.
In a statement issued after the sentencing, Cerys’ father Gareth branded the jail term “an insult.”
“Today we have finally got some justice for Cerys after more than 12 years of hell.
“Finally we can say it as it is, Boparan is a child killer. He has broken our hearts.
“But in reality Boparan will only serve around 15 months behind bars in total for killing a child and destroying several lives, which is a complete insult.”
Boparan admitted to causing death by dangerous driving in court. He has also been banned from driving for three years and nine months.
Jailing Boparan, Judge Melbourne Inman QC said he had showed “an arrogant disregard for the safety of others” when he got behind the wheel that day.
“The quality of her short life was destroyed as in many ways was that of her parents,” he said. “Finally, Cerys yielded to her injuries and disabilities and your criminal actions eventually took her life away from her.”
Before sentencing, Boparan’s barrister James Sturman, said: “This was a stupid and immature piece of bad driving at high speed over a relatively small distance by a young man, 19 at the time, then driving for six months, and he has caused devastation to Cerys Edwards and her family.”
He said Boparan had been “in a hurry to get home” at the time of the accident and had “made a mistake”.
He had since tried to live “a law-abiding life.”
