NO-ONE will face criminal charges in connection with a crash which left a teenager in a critical condition...because police have never been able to establish who was driving.

A boy was left in fighting for his life after the crash in Nayland Road, Great Horkesley, last January.

A silver Volkswagen Golf left the carriageway and flipped onto its side before skidding through a fence and into a family’s garden.

The next morning they discovered blood from a casualty on the front step.

Police confirmed six people had been in the car at the time - too many than is legal for a standard Golf.

Investigators shut a mile-long stretch of the road for several hours while the investigation into the smash was launched.

Five other teenagers were in the car at the time.

Their ages ranged between 13 and 18 and they were each arrested in the hours following the collision on suspicion of causing serious injury by dangerous driving, driving while unfit through drink or drugs, failing to stop and failing to report a collision.

Three of them also needed hospital treatment.

Gazette:

None of them were charged with those offences, but Johnny O’Donoghue, 19, of Bashley Road in Park Royal, London, was summonsed to court in November, where he denied a charge of failing to give information relating to the identification of a driver when required.

But on the day of a scheduled trial at Colchester Magistrates’ Court on Friday, the Crown Prosecution Service asked for the charge to be dropped.

Lesley Chipps, prosecuting, said they could not prove to the required standard he knew who was driving at the time.

“The Crown will offer no evidence and ask you to dismiss the charges,” she said.

The bench agreed and the trial did not proceed.

An application was made on Mr Donoghue’s behalf for legal fees and travel expenses incurred to make it to court.

Essex Police have confirmed there is currently no action being taken against anyone else in connection with this case meaning no-one will be punished for the horror smash.

Fire crews also attended the incident last year with one person being cut from the car.