The terrifying new threat on Britain's roads that's already killed a toddler, pensioner and nine-year-old girl... and why we're all at risk: BETH HALE
With an impish grin and a sparkle in her eyes, Louisa Palmisano was a bubbly, thriving three year old.
But just before 10am one sunny Saturday morning, her life was cut short when she was hit by a car while out walking hand-in-hand with her parents.
The turmoil the tragedy has wreaked on the family of the little girl – known as Lulu by those who loved her - was underlined in a short statement they released following her death in February. 'We were simply enjoying a happy family day out in Manchester when this unimaginable tragedy struck. In an instant, our lives were shattered beyond repair.'
But how much has the 'unbearable pain' they spoke of then been amplified by the facts that lie behind what happened that day? For, as it emerged in court last week, Louisa's death was not the result of an unavoidable accident or careless lapse of concentration, but rather the aftermath of one man's drug-fuelled madness.
Manchester Crown Court heard that Rawal Rehman, 35, had taken 'at least 20 lines of cocaine' in the seven hours before he got behind the wheel of his Mercedes Sprinter van, driving through the city centre where he ignored stop signs, collided with a tram and then careered on to the pavement, ploughing into Louisa and her parents.
Not one line of cocaine. Twenty.
Rehman pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving and will be sentenced next month, when his drug consumption - not to mention his previous conviction for conspiracy to pervert the course of justice after he torched a car involved in a hit-and-run which killed a 25-year-old man - will doubtless carry weight.
The devastating void that Louisa's family spoke of is one that is all too familiar to an ever-growing number impacted by drivers who get behind the wheel while high on drugs.
Louisa Palmisano was a bubbly, thriving three-year-old. Her life was cut short when she was hit by a car while out walking hand-in-hand with her parents
Rawal Rehman, 35, pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving and will be sentenced next month
Rehman had taken 'at least 20 lines of cocaine' before he got behind the wheel of his Mercedes Sprinter and ignored stop signs, collided with a tram and careered on to the pavement
As the Mail revealed in October, drug driving deaths have risen by 164 per cent in the last decade – soaring from 47 deaths in 2014 to 124 in 2023, cocaine and cannabis being the most prevalent substances.
That means that drug-driving fatalities now account for eight per cent of deaths on the nation's roads.
Only three weeks ago, the National Police Chiefs' Council released alarming figures illustrating just how wide the issue of drug driving is.
From December 1 to January 1, a nationwide campaign saw 45 police forces undertake 58,675 roadside tests for drink and drugs. Nearly 8,000 drivers were tested for drugs. A massive 42 per cent of those tests were positive.
Shocking statistics, and even more alarming when you consider the words of Jamie Hassall, executive director of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety. This week he told the Mail that the limited available official statistics were likely to be just the 'tip of an iceberg'.
What is clear is that the tally is alarmingly high.
Take last week, by way of example. On Tuesday, the same day as Lulu's killer Rawal Rehman appeared in court, another drug driver was standing in the dock in Glasgow.
The court heard how Robert Shirra-Gibb, 84, had been mown down by a lorry as he crossed the road days before Christmas in 2023. Driver Edward Feelie, 54, had failed to stop at a red light and was found to have six times the limit of cocaine in his bloodstream. (Limits were introduced to tighten drug driving legislation in 2015.)
On the following day, Wednesday, in a London courtroom, bus driver Martin Asolo-Agogua, 23, was warned that a prison sentence was inevitable after he admitted ploughing into and killing a little girl, nine-year-old Ada Bicakci.
Nine-year-old Ada Bicakci was killed after being hit by a bus
Bus driver Martin Asolo-Agogua, 23, was warned that a prison sentence was inevitable after he admitted ploughing into and killing Ada. He had been taking cannabis the night before
The driver, who admitted causing death by dangerous driving and driving while unfit through drugs, had been taking cannabis - the most used drug in England and Wales - the night before.
The effects of alcohol on driving have, of course, long been emphasised.
But with drug use so prevalent - statistics show that more than 5 per cent of 16 to 24 year olds have used cocaine and more than 15 per cent cannabis - grieving families argue that more action is urgently needed to combat this newer scourge of the road.
The Mail spoke to several families of victims of drug drivers, who are united in their calls to heighten awareness and tighten punishment.
Grieving mother Claire Reynolds, 39, knows all too well the agonies that Lulu's family must be enduring after her six-year-old daughter was killed by a drug driver four years ago.
Sharlotte-Sky Naglis was walking along the pavement with her father, near their home in Stoke-on-Trent, when speeding John Owen, 44, lost control of his car and mowed her down.
The family's agony continued as Owen's blood, taken in the wake of the accident, could not be tested without his consent. He was in a coma for 11 weeks – leaving a family grieving and without answers.
Tests eventually showed he had twice the legal limit of cocaine in his system and was nearly twice the legal limit for alcohol. He was jailed for six years and two months in 2022 after admitting causing death by dangerous driving.
Sharlotte-Sky Naglis was walking along the pavement with her father, near their home in Stoke-on-Trent, when speeding John Owen, 44, lost control of his car and mowed her down
Tests showed Owen had twice the legal limit of cocaine in his system and was nearly twice the legal limit for alcohol
But no punishment can ever make up for all that's been lost.
'I am not the same person or mum I used to be,' Claire, an account manager who has a teenage son and daughter, explains.
'I am very closed off. And it has affected the whole family. We don't do family trips or celebrate birthdays or Christmas like we used to. We don't because it doesn't feel like we are a complete family unit anymore. Sharlotte is always missing.
'People say it gets easier with time, but it doesn't. It gets harder as your longing for the person you have lost grows.
'He made the choice that day to go drinking, take cocaine and then get behind the wheel. The car is a weapon when someone is intoxicated or on cocaine. The punishment is not enough. It is upsetting knowing that he could be out soon spending time with his family. It is not fair.'
She adds: 'I am in touch with other families through support groups and it just feels like it is always the victims who get the harshest sentences and get forgotten about.'
Claire has become a passionate voice for raising awareness, but also for a change in law to allow blood samples to be analysed without a suspect's consent.
Consent is not the only issue with the current system, either.
In some cases, motorists who fail roadside tests have been allowed to continue driving for up to six months because of a backlog in lab testing of confirmatory blood samples – which are typically required as evidence to pursue a charge - and delays in cases reaching court.
It means some drivers have gone on to kill behind the wheel while their results are pending.
Take Tim Burgess, 48, who was killed in Cheshire in July last year when Joshua Eldred, 31, ploughed into his car while driving at more than 65mph on the wrong side of the road.
Mr Burgess died in the arms of girlfriend Wendy Wall, who was driving their Suzuki and was seriously injured in the crash.
Drunk Eldred was high on cocaine - two-and-a-half times the drug limit.
He had been in another crash ten days earlier, but had been bailed pending the results of his blood test, meaning he was free to drive. That test later confirmed he had been taking cocaine at the time of the first crash.
Tim's sister Linzi Stewart, 49, has written to the Home Office calling for roadside saliva samples to be used as evidence to prosecute drug drivers and take them off the road - rather than having to wait for a blood sample to be processed.
'Obtaining an evidential blood sample... is not always possible. Even when it is, there is a shocking delay of up to six months before the results return from the laboratory - during which time the drug driver is free to continue driving,' she wrote.
'We firmly believe that the failings in this time-consuming and flawed system played a significant role in Tim's tragic and needless death.'
Trainee teacher Summer Mace, 26, knew nothing of the drug element in the accident that killed her mother, sister and stepfather in January 2023 until speeding driver Aurelijus Cielevicius, 39, appeared in court.
Only then did she learn he had been high on crystal meth, as well as a cocktail of other drugs including mephedrone and cannabis.
Lisa Carter, 49, right, her husband Paul, 41, centre, and her daughter Jade, 25, left, had been visiting family near their Norfolk home when they were involved in a head-on collision
Aurelijus Cielevicius, 39, had been high on crystal meth, as well as a cocktail of other drugs including mephedrone and cannabis, at the time of the crash that killed Lisa, Paul and Jade
Hairdresser Lisa Carter, 49, her husband Paul, 41, and her daughter Jade, 25, had been visiting family near their Norfolk home when they were involved in a head-on collision with Cielevicius. In October 2023, he was sentenced to ten and a half years in prison after admitting causing death by dangerous driving while 15 times over the drug-drive limit. The combined speed of the accident was more than 150mph.
Summer is still reeling. She had been staying with her girlfriend, to whom she is now engaged, on the night of the accident, so it was only the following morning, when she arrived for work at a school in King's Lynn and was met by police that she learned the devastating news.
'Three of the most important people in my life were just ripped away from me in one hit,' says Summer.
Cielevicius, meanwhile, walked away from the crash relatively unscathed.
'If he's allowed out on parole, he could be free in 2030, which is crazy. It's insane - he's taken three lives.
'I think if you are that high on drugs and you get behind the wheel of a car you are going to kill someone.
'We struggle every single day - anniversaries, birthdays, Christmas, all these things we are missing out on. My partner, she proposed to me last year, now my mum's not here for that, my sister's not here for that, my stepdad is not here; when I have kids they are not going to be here.
'I'm getting my teaching degree which my mum always wanted me to have and I can't tell her about that. Yet I know he will be sat in his category C prison, probably laughing with other people, playing on a Playstation.'
Is there an answer?
Certainly, families like those the Mail have spoken to would hope so.
Nicolas Lyes, of the road safety charity IAM RoadSmart, is unequivocal.
'Put simply, drug driving is dangerous and ruins lives,' he says. 'As well as impacting on your health, recreational drug use significantly impacts your decision-making process and slows down reaction times at the wheel, creating a lethal environment on the roads for both the driver and other road users.'
Prior to 2015, police had to prove that any drug taken had caused impairment.
Legal limits might sound curious, given the illegality of the drugs in question, but in fact the setting of limits for the presence of eight illegal drugs, including cannabis and cocaine, and eight prescription drugs was designed to make it easier to prove the drug driving offence.
The Government decided against a zero limit as certain medicinal drugs are absorbed in the body and produce trace effects. They also wanted to avoid penalising drivers for accidental exposure to drugs, such as inhaling cannabis smoke in a public place. However, if a driver is affected in any way, it's an offence.
Alarmingly, in December, Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency data revealed another particularly damning statistic.
In the 11 years to July 2024, 33,020 British drivers were convicted of drug-driving multiple times. Of those, 3,431 were caught on four or more occasions - including 54 who were prosecuted at least ten times.
Yet more evidence, surely, that it's time to introduce stronger sentences to stop the drug-driving tide.
