TWO MEN have been jailed for a total of 15 years after a Christmas Day crash on the Stratford Road in Hall Green resulted in the death of a passenger.
Asim Shaikh died five days after the crash in the early hours of December 25, 2014.
He was the passenger in a stolen red Skoda driven by Kaesar Ali, aged 27 from Clarence Road, Sparkhill.
Ali (pictured left) and co-defendant, Mohammed Kamran, aged 28 from Meadway, Yardley, were driving at speeds of up to 78mph in the 30mph zone.
Kamran, driving a silver Ford Focus, was side by side with the Skoda approaching the junction with School Road, when it clipped the other car causing the Skoda to veer off and crashed into a set of traffic lights and overturned.
Ali and Mr Shaikh, aged 29 from Hall Green, were taken to hospital with serious injuries, but Asim failed to recover.
Ali pleaded guilty to the death of his friend by dangerous driving and was sentenced to six years.
He was also sentenced to 16 months for a further offence of dangerous driving, again in a stolen vehicle, that occurred several months after the collision.
He also received three years for theft and money laundering, all to run consecutively.
Kamran pleaded not guilty to death by dangerous driving and following two trials has been convicted of Mr Shaikh’s death and sentenced to four years.
Both will be banned from driving, Ali for eight years and Kamran for five, and both will be required to sit an extended retest before being allowed behind the wheel again.
Det Sgt Paul Hughes said: “This is a perfect example of how dangerous driving can change lives, not only for the victim and his family, but the drivers who risked their own lives too, and will now have to spend many years behind bars wondering if it was worth it.
“Speed limits are there for a reason, not just for busy routes, but for when roads are quiet too as this case shows.”
