A TEENAGER banned from driving could have killed his friends when he flipped his car as he tried to outrun police on the A19, a court heard.

Christopher Taylor fled from the wreckage of the Vauxhall, which had landed on its roof in a hedge, and crawled through fields and a slurry pit.

He turned up at a farmhouse, gave a false name, was given a change of clothes and then a lift to his home in Redmarshall, near Stockton.

But the farmer then realised something was not right, and gave police the 19-year-old’s address - where he was arrested a short time later.

Paramedics had been called to the scene of the crash - at the Tontine turn-off for Stokesley, North Yorkshire - to help two injured passengers. Afterwards, one of the occupants said he had “felt petrified” while his pal said: “He just left us, not knowing if we had been seriously injured or not.”

Judge Howard Crowson told Taylor yesterday: “They were very fortunate they were not significantly harmed. The car rolled end-over-end twice - a real risk of death. It is hard to conceive of more dangerous acts of driving.”That was a risk you took with other people’s lives. Other drivers were also put at risk.”

The court heard how Taylor refused to stop for police after being followed from the Market Place in Thirsk, North Yorkshire, and headed for the dual-carriageway.

He reached speeds of up to 100mph as he swerved in and out of traffic, “undertaking” two cars as he headed north on the A19 at about 6pm on January 31. He lost control of the hatchback as he tried to come off at the A172 slip-road, having almost overshot it, prosecutor Peter Sabiston told the court.

Alex Bousfield, mitigating, said Taylor had panicked when he saw the police car because he was disqualified and also was in possession of a small amount of cannabis.

Mr Bousfield said the teenager had a troubled background and drug problems, but has been working well in prison and is acting as a mentor for others.

Taylor, of Ferguson Way, Redmarshall, was jailed for six months on top of a 56-month sentence for acts of violence with swords. He was also banned from the roads for four years and seven months after he admitted dangerous driving, driving while disqualified and without a licence.