The widow of a Ryanair pilot killed in a motorway crash has said she was failed by the system at the "most traumatic and vulnerable" time of her life, after months of uncertainty over whether the killer driver's sentence would be cut.
Hannah Greenhalgh and the family of Jamie Fernandes, who died when a lorry smashed into their taxi on the M62 near junction eight for Burtonwood on July 10, 2024, were sent letters in June telling them Anthony Burns, 63, may have his sentence "recalculated" under moves to free up prison cells. This came only five months after he was jailed for 10 years.
Exemption confirmed after outcry
The families only received confirmation that Burns would be exempt from early release when Prime Minister Andy Burnham said people jailed for manslaughter and death by dangerous driving would be excluded, following the national outcry over the possibility of PC Andrew Harper's killers being freed.
Mrs Greenhalgh, who married her husband in Las Vegas three months before his death, said she only found out about Burns' exemption through media reports. She added that the June letter had "reopened wounds that I've tried to heal for the past two years".
She told the Daily Mail: "Victims shouldn't have to read through headlines to be informed about changes that impact them. Victims like me have a lifelong sentence of grief and voices of bereaved families should be heard from the beginning, not after months of fear and uncertainty."
Crash details and sentencing
Mr Fernandes' mother Amanda Lindsay told the same paper that bereaved families had been put through "needless uncertainty" before the Prime Minister's announcement and called their treatment "appalling".
Mr Greenhalgh, a 28-year-old captain, and Mr Fernandes, a 24-year-old first officer, were in the back of a taxi in queuing traffic when Burns ploughed his 44-tonne lorry into the vehicle at 50mph, braking only a second before impact. Burns, of Upton, pleaded guilty to two counts of causing death by dangerous driving and one count of causing serious injury by dangerous driving to taxi driver Rashid Mehmood in the crash at 5.30am on the M62.
The pilots were being driven back to their base at Liverpool John Lennon Airport after transporting an empty plane to Luton hours earlier.
System and early release scheme
Mrs Greenhalgh added: "I feel failed by a system that I put trust in at the most traumatic and vulnerable time of my life. When a judge listens to all of the evidence, hears from everyone involved and passes sentence, I believe that sentence means what it says."
The Labour government said it inherited a prison system on the brink of collapse with fewer than 100 spaces left in the summer of 2024. Adult male prisons are currently operating at around 98% capacity. From October 1 this year, a change to sentence rules means prisoners convicted of less serious offences, who currently serve between 40 and 50% of their term, will leave prison after serving only a third.
Mr Burnham previously said prisoners including sex offenders would be exempt from early release. Following campaigning from the family of PC Harper, who was killed after being dragged by a car for a mile, the Prime Minister extended this to include any form of manslaughter and causing death by dangerous driving.
Responding to the families' concerns, the Ministry of Justice said Mr Burnham had asked for a plan on how to revise the early release scheme by early September to "keep more of the most dangerous offenders behind bars".
When Burns was sentenced, Judge Simon Medland KC told him: "Nobody suggests for one moment that you set out that day to cause harm or injury, still less death, to anybody. For decades by then, you had been a commercial driver and an experienced HGV man. You were not on your phone, you were not under the influence of drink or drugs."
"Whether you were on a sort of robotic autopilot, who knows? You do not know. You were driving at 56mph in a 40mph advisory in torrential rain, with heavy road water and spray. This was a speed which was highly inappropriate for the prevailing weather conditions."
"This dreadful, tragic episode killed two men and seriously injured a third. You have heard, and will have understood, the terrible and enduring impact which this episode had on the family and friends of Mr Fernandes and Mr Greenhalgh, and the enduring day to day impact it has on Mr Mehmood."
"The word grief does not quite sum up the feeling. There is always, of course, the oppressive guilt of the survivor, which you probably feel yourself. This sentence is not in any way a value of their lives. That would be impossible. The court must instead reach for what it sees as a just sentence in this case."
Unconnected to the government's early release scheme, Burns has taken the decision to appeal against the length of his sentence. Mrs Greenhalgh said the driver had "never said sorry" or provided an explanation for the crash.
She said: "Death by dangerous driving is not seen as murder or like killing someone in any other way, even though it is. Anthony Burns thinks the sentence is excessive. Was killing two people and injuring the taxi driver not excessive?"
