A DANGER driver who wrote off an £18,000 BMW when he smashed into it while being pursued by the police has been jailed for 12 months.

Jack Brown was at the wheel of a silver Volkswagen Golf when he accelerated away from a patrol car along Parkwood Street in Keighley, Bradford Crown Court heard.

Brown, 26, of Westwood, Carleton, near Skipton, crossed to the opposite side of the carriageway to overtake a line of vehicles and rounded a blind bend on the wrong side of the road, prosecutor Paul Nicholson said.

He crashed into the BMW that was going at 20mph at the time on a journey between Bingley and Keighley.

The driver told how the Volkswagen Golf came at him at 50mph and the next thing he knew his face was hit by the BMW’s airbag.

The car span in the road, the court heard.

Meanwhile, the man’s partner, who was the front seat passenger, was crying out in pain, Mr Nicholson said.

Brown ran past covered in blood after struggling with a police officer at the accident scene, the court was told.

Paramedics tended to the injured woman.

She was taken on a stretcher to an ambulance and transported to hospital.

The woman sustained a suspected cracked rib while the man had a strained and badly bruised right shoulder that was at first feared to be fractured, the court heard.

The BMW was wrecked beyond repair, the court was told.

Brown pleaded guilty to driving dangerously on April 11 and to having no insurance.

His fingerprints were on the Golf and he left blood at the accident scene.

Brown had 24 previous convictions for 34 offences, including serving a lengthy jail sentence for being a “third strike” house burglar.

His barrister, Mark Brookes, said Brown insisted that he had hit the BMW from behind.

He was a telesales worker who helped to care for his uncle after he had suffered a serious injury.

Brown had kept out of trouble since being released from the burglary sentence he was given in 2015.

He drove his then girlfriend’s car that day after they had an argument.

The Recorder of Bradford, Judge Jonathan Durham Hall QC, said Brown tried to outrun the police at speed.

He then fought with an officer at the crash scene and ran off without doing anything to help the couple in the BMW.

Brown was banned from driving for three years, the disqualification to begin after he is freed from jail.