Shropshire driver who died when car hit wall was was almost three times drink-drive limit

Lewis Holyoake was not wearing a seatbelt when his Vauxhall Corsa crashed into the stone wall near to his home in Melverley, near Oswestry.

An inquest at Shirehall was told Mr Holyoake, 30, of Bontaine Farm, had not been drinking on the evening of September 10 when he had been giving lifts to friends to a party in Market Drayton.

The inquest heard however, that at around half past midnight on September 11, Mr Holyoake stopped driving his friends around and decided to go to a leaving party for the landlord of the Firtree Inn at Crew Green.

A statement from one of his friends, Thomas Poutney, who was also at the party, said he and Mr Holyoake left at around 3am, with Lewis following behind in his car.

It said: "Lewis did not appear to be drunk and did not take drugs.

"He did not give me any cause for concern about driving home. His headlights were working fine."

The inquest heard a statement from a nearby neighbour who heard a loud "thud" at around 3.30am on September 11, but was unable to see anything out of the ordinary and went back to bed.

The crash scene was discovered shortly after 7am the following morning when a tractor driver drove along the unclassified lane and saw Mr Holyoake's car which had collided with the wall.

As part of the post-mortem, blood was analysed and it was discovered Mr Holyoake had 237 milligrammes of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood in his system. The legal drink drive limit is 80 milligrammes.

John Ellery, coroner for Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin, said: "I record that Lewis Holyoake died on September 11 and it was likely to have been at 3.25am.

"Lewis had been driving home a short distance and had almost made it home when he collided with that brick wall. The only explanation can be his driving was affected by the alcohol reading.

"The conclusion I reach is his death was due to a road traffic collision."