Teenagers died after young driver ‘lost control of car and hit a tree’
Three teenagers died in a car crash after they collided with a tree, an inquest heard.
Dafydd Huw Craven-Jones, 18, Morgan Jones, 17, and Sophie Bates, 17, died after the crash on May 25 last year.
The crash happened on a humpback bridge in Penkridge, Staffordshire, at 11.47pm.
The inquest into their deaths held at Stafford Coroners Court heard Mr Craven-Jones was the driver of the black Ford KA that collided ‘head-on with an established tree’.
He went to pick his three friends up from a house party in Penkridge and beforehand took a video of himself saying he drove 90mph in a 70mph zone.
He had only been given his driving licence six months before the crash in November 2023.
Mr Craven-Jones and Mr Jones, the front seat passenger, both died at the scene.
Ms Bates, a rear seat passenger in the car, was taken to Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham but died there.
Video taken by her beforehand appeared to show her sitting in the middle rear seat.
The fourth passenger, Brooke Varley, also 17 at the time, survived.
A tracking app on her phone ‘indicated a maximum speed of 85mph had been reached at some point during the 15-minute journey’.
But the court heard this could not be verified as accurate.
Ms Varley said in a statement after the crash that she was ‘so upset to have lost such amazing people from her life’.
She said: ‘Sophie was the kindest person who lived her life to the fullest. She is my inspiration to get better and do everything she didn’t get a chance to do. She will forever be in my heart.
‘Morgan was one of the funniest people I know. He was always respectful, kind and sweet. He always looked out for me.
‘Daf had a kind soul and loved his friends.’
The inquest heard that Mr Craven-Jones was wearing his seat belt but Mr Jones was not wearing his correctly and neither rear seat passengers were wearing seat belts.
Both Mr Craven-Jones and Mr Jones played rugby for Wrexham RFC’s youth team, who described them as ‘good friends on and off the field of play’.
There were no problems with the car that caused the crash and it had been correctly insured and had a full MOT, Sergeant Richard Moors said.
Mr Craven-Jones had no drink or drugs in his system and there is no evidence he was using his phone at the time of the crash, he added.
Assistant coroner Kelly Dixon recorded the deaths as a result of a road traffic collision.
She said that ‘inappropriate speed over the humped back bridge’ caused a loss of control.
Ms Dixon has issued a prevention of future deaths report to Staffordshire highways authority after a previous fatal collision on the same stretch of road.
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