A ‘drunk’ barmaid who piled six friends into her small car was ‘well over’ the alcohol limit when one of her passengers died in a crash, a court has heard.
Karla Dodds, 25, offered to take the group to a house party in her Hyundai i10, with four seated in the back and one ‘reluctantly’ climbing into the hatchback’s boot, jurors were told.
One of the passengers Truman Hub had his head hanging out of a rear window when Dodds lost control and collided with a lamppost in North Tyneside in the early hours of November 20, 2022.
The impact caused the car to overturn, leaving the 22-year-old passenger with unsurvivable injuries.
Dodds admitted causing Truman’s death by careless driving at Newcastle Crown Court while over the drink-drive limit, but she denies causing death by dangerous driving.
The court heard she had been out drinking in Whitley Bay on the night of the crash, after she finished work at a local pub.
After around two hours, she then picked up her six passengers to take them to a house party in Shiremoor.
Andrew Espley, prosecuting, said at the trial: ‘The prosecution case is that Karla Dodds caused the death of Truman Hub by driving dangerously in the early hours of the morning on Sunday, November 20, 2022.
Karla Dodds, 25, is seen leaving North Tyneside magistrates court in North Shields at an earlier hearing on March 5
Truman Hub (pictured with his girlfriend) had his head out of a rear window when Dodds lost control and collided with a lamppost in the early hours of November 20, 2022
Dodds (pictured) admitted causing Truman’s death by careless driving at Newcastle Crown Court while over the drink-drive limit but she denies causing death by dangerous driving
‘In brief, Karla Dodds had been out at work the previous day, the Saturday night, as a barmaid in a local pub.
‘She then went out drinking in Whitley Bay from 11.30pm, driving her car from home to the pub.
‘After spending a couple of hours in the Havana nightclub, in Whitley Bay, she picked up six other people to take them to a house party in Shiremoor.
‘By then she was well over the legal limit for alcohol for driving.’
Mr Espley said one man got in the boot of the Hyundai and four got in the back of the car, including Truman, who was from North Shields, and his girlfriend.
He added: ‘He was hanging out of the rear passenger side window as the car headed towards a roundabout on the A191.
‘We say the defendant was driving too fast in the circumstances. The actual speed was not, of itself, grossly excessive but was too fast in all the circumstances.
‘The driver’s side of the car hit a lamppost on the driver’s side as she came off the roundabout, heading to a fairly sharp left.
‘The collision itself caused the car to turn over onto its passenger side, crushing Truman Hub, who was still hanging out of the window.
‘The car then turned on the roof, coming to a rest on the driver’s side, by now a short distance from the point of collision.’
Jurors were told Dodds has pleaded guilty to causing death by careless driving while over the alcohol limit.
Mr Espley said: ‘She accepts her driving caused the death of Truman Hub but she denies her driving was dangerous.’
The prosecutor said the manner of Dodd’s driving was not the sole cause of Truman’s death and said he is unlikely to have died had he not been hanging out of the window when Dodds crashed.
But he added: ‘We say the car rolled over because of the dangerous way Karla Dodds was driving.
Truman (left) is pictured with his brothers Hylton (middle) and Myles (right)
Karla Dodds is seen leaving North Tyneside magistrates court at an earlier date
‘She was well over the limit for alcohol, the car was overloaded, there were seven people in it, one of them was in the boot and on any view she knew her car was overloaded and there was someone hanging out of her rear passenger window.’
The court heard the man who got in the boot, who is more than six foot tall, said he did so reluctantly.
He said he felt a bump then ‘everything seemed to spin or rotate’ and he banged his head. He was helped out afterwards and lost consciousness for a time.
Mr Espley said another passenger said Dodds had offered to drive them and said she’d had a few drinks but was ‘ok to drive’ and he told her to have some water.
He claimed she was driving too fast and said he told her to slow down and turned the music down at one point but she ignored him and turned the music back up. He said he also told her she had ‘far too many people in the car’.
He said he was unconscious for a time after the crash then heard Dodds shouting ‘We’ve got to go, we’ve got to go’ before seeing she and her friend had left the scene. He said he then saw Truman, who had been sitting up, fall back and people started doing CPR but they couldn’t find a pulse.
Mr Espley said: ‘We say it would have been obvious to Karla Dodds something had happened to Truman Hub, probably that he was seriously injured and she left the scene anyway with her friend.’
Truman’s girlfriend said there were four people in the back of the car and none were wearing seatbelts but those in the front were. She said the music was ‘really loud’ and people were singing along. She said Truman put his head out of the window to feel the wind and she grabbed him and told him to ‘stop acting like an idiot and get your head back in’.
Mr Espley said Dodds ‘must have been aware’ Truman was hanging out of the window but she says she wasn’t. Prosecutors say she ought to have been aware of it, if she wasn’t, as she had responsibility for the safety of her passengers.
The court heard Dodds was nearly twice the drink-drive limit almost four hours after the collision.
When later interviewed by police, she said the ‘whole thing was a bit of a blur’ and she didn’t know Truman was fatally injured when she left and was ‘in shock’.
Asked if she thought it was dangerous to have seven people in a car designed for five people, she said: ‘Yes I absolutely agree with that and I apologise’.
Dodds denies causing death by dangerous driving and the trial continues.
