Family photosThree teenagers died in a crash after the driver lost control of the car while travelling at speed over a humpback bridge and hit a tree, an inquest has heard.
Dafydd Hûw Craven-Jones, 18, from Wrexham was driving the Ford Ka on Cannock Road in Penkridge, Staffordshire, just before midnight on 25 May last year when the crash happened.
He and Morgan Jones, 17 – also from Wrexham – were pronounced dead at the scene, while Sophie Bates, 17, from Stafford, died three days later in hospital.
The other rear seat passenger, Brooke Varley, was seriously injured but survived.
The inquest held in Stafford on Wednesday was told neither of the girls sitting in the back of the car were wearing seatbelts and Mr Jones was not wearing his correctly, but Mr Craven-Jones was wearing his seatbelt.
On the night of the crash, Mr Craven-Jones, who had held his driving licence for five months, had driven to Penkridge in Staffordshire from Wrexham to pick up Mr Jones, who was at a house party there.
Friends Sophie Bates and Brooke Varley also got into the car and the four went for a drive to Cannock, before heading back on the same road in the direction of Penkridge.
Sgt Richard Moores from Staffordshire Police told the hearing Ms Varley had said Mr Craven-Jones was driving “a bit fast” on the way back from Cannock and she had asked him to slow down, while telling Ms Bates she “didn’t like the way the car was driving”.
Ms Varley told police at the time that she had a “rollercoaster feeling” and was holding on to the headrest of the passenger seat in front of her when she felt the car swerve and then blacked out.
She woke to hear someone on the phone to the emergency services.
Family photoIt is not known how fast the car was travelling at the time of the accident. A tracker app on Ms Varley’s phone showed a top speed of 85mph during the journey – but Sgt Moores said this was not reliable.
A Snapchat video recovered from Ms Bates’ phone showed a video Mr Craven-Jones had made when driving earlier in the evening, in which he said he was worried he would get a ticket for driving 90mph in a 70mph zone.
The inquest was also told warning signs for the bridge had been under consideration for improvement by Staffordshire County Highways.
Giving her conclusions of death by road traffic collision, Kelly Dixon, assistant coroner for south Staffordshire, said on the balance of probabilities “inappropriate speed” had led to the collision.
Mr Craven-Jones was a new driver, having passed his test five months previously, in November 2023, she said.
The fact that no seat belts were worn in the back of the car and at least one of the girls collided with Mr Craven-Jones was likely to have contributed to his injuries, she added.
Ms Dixon said she would be making a prevention of future deaths report to Staffordshire County Highways regarding the hazard road markings and signage for the bridge where the accident took place, which had been “under consideration for improvement” since January 2024, but which still had not happened.
There have been three crashes on the road since 2017, two with fatalities.
