Crime
A Nigerian van driver who was delivering blood to a hospital has been jailed for three and a half years after deliberately running over a cyclist who spat at him.
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According to the BBC, Mark Okotie, 44, knocked the man off his bike in New Cross Road, Lewisham, during the evening rush hour on 20 March 2024, leaving him with several fractures.
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Woolwich Crown Court heard Okotie had moved his van into the left lane “seemingly without looking” and came close to the cyclist. At the next set of traffic lights, the man spat towards the van, and it went through the open driver’s window.
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Okotie, from Southwark, was jailed for three years and six months, having been found guilty of causing grievous bodily harm with intent after a trial earlier this month.
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Dashcam footage from inside the van, shown to the court, captured Okotie turning the steering wheel sharply, sending the cyclist under two of the vehicle’s wheels.
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The victim needed “numerous screws and plates” in his pelvis and femur. In a statement released by the Met Police, he said he had been an active person, but his injuries had stopped him from jogging and doing other physical activities.
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Sentencing, Recorder Neil Haythorne told Okotie: “In a moment of extreme road rage, which appears entirely out of character from what I have heard about you, you caused serious injury to a cyclist.”
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Mandisa Knights, mitigating, said Okotie, a father of eight with a one-year-old grandchild, mentored young people to keep them away from the violence he had been exposed to when he was younger.
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She said “a momentary relapse in retaliation” had led to “grave consequences” and he would now have to face the boys he had mentored and admit what he had done.
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Det Insp Steven Andrews, from the Met, said Okotie had been carrying blood “destined for hospital patients in need”.
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“Instead of continuing a journey intended to support potentially life-saving treatment, he chose to place someone else’s life at risk,” Andrews said.
