Passengers tried to take the wheel as Napier youth hit truck at more than 100kmh

A teenager had been smoking cannabis before getting behind the wheel and crashing at 100km/h. Photo / File

A car driven by a cannabis-using youth was estimated to be doing more than 100km/h after it struck a parked truck on a main road in Napier.

The details of the crash in fine weather on the Sunday afternoon of February 16 this year unfolded as the now 20-year-old Brayden Thomas Winson, of Napier, appeared in Napier District Court today after admitting a charge of careless use of a motor vehicle.

Judge Bridget Mackintosh fined him $600, plus court costs of $130, and disqualified him from driving for six months.

Winson was aged 19 at the time and as a driver on a restricted licence was not entitled to have passengers, according to a police summary.

It said all three in the car had been smoking cannabis at an address before the incident, which included the car being driven along a footpath and hitting several fences, as passengers tried to take control of the vehicle.

The police summary said Winson was travelling to the west on Kennedy Rd, a 50km/h zone, and was passing beneath the Hawke's Bay Expressway overbridge when he started to feel unwell.

He tensed-up and hit the accelerator.

The vehicle mounted the footpath and hit several fences over about 100 metres before being driven between a truck and another fence, slamming into the left-hand side of the truck and sliding "uncontrollably" across a grass reserve.

"Even with the defendant's vehicle being slowed from impacting with the truck, his speed post this collision was calculated at over 100km/h," the summary said.

He was taken to hospital, as was at least one other passenger, but injuries were not serious.

An evidential blood test taken at the hospital did not detect any alcohol, but the blood did contain active cannabis ingredient tetrahydrocannabinol.

Winson admitted he had used cannabis earlier and that he should not have been driving.

But a charge of impaired driving was withdrawn because police believed it could not have been proven that the driver was influenced by drink or drugs at the time.

The Cannabis Legalisation and Control Bill, which is subject of a referendum being run in conjunction with the General Election, would, if enacted, make it illegal for a person aged under 20 years to purchase or possess cannabis, unless authorised.

A person supplying to a person aged under 20 years could be sentenced to up to four years in jail, while a corporate body (as in a licensed commercial seller) could be fined up to $150,000.