Wealthy estate agent who abandoned his £100k BMW after ploughing into a motorway crash barrier spared prison after insisting he had not drunk any alcohol
A wealthy estate agent who abandoned his luxury BMW after ploughing into a crash barrier has been spared a prison sentence after insisting he had not drunk any alcohol.
Scott Morgan - who has two previous drink-related driving convictions - lost control of his £100,000 electric i7 M Sport on a motorway as he was driving home from work on a Friday at 8.30pm.
But instead of calling police when he regained consciousness, the 'naive' 46-year-old - who earns £144,000 a year - contacted his wife who collected him, and only reported being the driver 48 hours later.
A court heard police only attended the crash scene because the BMW's automatic accident detection system sent an SOS call.
Police found debris on the motorway and the car dumped on the hard shoulder, its back end slightly protruding onto lane one.
A helicopter was even scrambled amid fears the driver may be injured and wandering nearby.
Officers attended Morgan's gated £1.4million home in Hale, Greater Manchester but the property was in darkness and his mobile phone was switched off.
When he 'eventually' turned up at a police station two days later he claimed a recovery vehicle had gone to move the wreckage onto the hard shoulder, the court heard.
He said he had been waiting for officers to arrive and left in the assumption they would have been alerted by the SOS device.
He claimed he went to a family member's house, who checked him over for possible injuries as he 'has a bad relationship with hospitals', and asked his PA to make arrangements for the car to be collected.
Morgan denied drinking alcohol in the run up to the crash and insisted: 'I waited for the police but they did not show up and I made my way away from the scene.'
Officers said he would have been breathalysed had he stayed at the roadside.
At Chester magistrates court, Morgan - who runs Liverpool-based Move Residentials - pleaded guilty to falling to report an accident.
A charge of causing a vehicle to be left in a dangerous position was withdrawn.
He was sentenced to a 12-month community order with 200 hours of unpaid work.
He was told to pay £199 in costs and surcharge and was banned from driving for six months.
Estate agent Scott Morgan outside Chester magistrates court where his lawyer said he had been 'naive' not to report the crash, adding that he 'misunderstood his responsibilities'
The married father-of-one could had faced up to six months jail under sentencing guidelines.
The court heard Morgan had convictions for drink driving in 2005 and failing to provide a sample in 2018.
He also had nine points on his driving licence for three speeding matters.
The incident occurred on March 7 on the M56 near Chester.
Officers found the luxury electric vehicle 'positioned half on the hard shoulder protruding slightly into lane one' with all its airbags deployed prosecutor Lisa McGuire said.
'The vehicle had heavy crash damage to the front end.'
'Debris' was 'across the motorway', with other traffic 'required to avoid the back end' of the BMW, which was a write-off.
The prosecutor said that when Morgan 'eventually' contacted police on March 9 he said he had 'left the scene because the police had failed to attend'.
'He also stated he was unaware that he had to report to police,' she added, saying a breath sample would 'certainly' have been requested had he been traced promptly.
Morgan told a probation worker he had been driving home from work 'after a stressful week', the court heard.
He explained how he 'lost control' while manoeuvring from the middle lane to the exit.
'When he woke up the recovery service was already there,' the worker told the court.
Morgan said the recovery service moved the wreckage to the hard shoulder.
'He did not know that he had to report an accident given that only his car was involved,' the court heard.
Morgan told the probation worker he 'uses alcohol approximately twice a month but had not consumed alcohol on the night of the incident,' the court heard
'He learnt his lesson with regards to the previous convictions. If he does use alcohol he will always get an Uber home.'
Morgan's lawyer Marc McCormick said he had 'no control' over where the recovery team left the damaged car, and would have given a police sample had police turned up before he left.
'I feel confident that this is more born from being naive than anything else and Mr Morgan has asked me to express is his deepest apology,' he added.
'He misunderstood his responsibilities and failed to report.
'Mr Morgan assures me that he does not intend to appear before the court again.'
In sentencing, JP Olga Randall described it as a 'very, very serious offence'.
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