A DISQUALIFIED driver reverse rammed a police car in a desperate bid to escape pursuing officers, a court heard.

But in performing the dangerous manoeuvre, slightly injuring an officer emerging from the police vehicle at the time, Simon Paul Faulkner stalled his Ford Focus and was unable to drive away.

Durham Crown Court heard that he and another man were then seen fleeing on foot via the passenger door, but, following a search, he was found hiding in bushes nearby and arrested.

Andrew Finlay, prosecuting, said it came at the end of a short high-speed pursuit in Seaham, County Durham, shortly before 1am on July 30 last year.

Police initially began following the Focus after it was seen being driven from an address in Ryton Crescent, with no lights on.

The police car’s flashing blue lights were illuminated and siren activated, but Faulkner drove off, at speed.

Mr Finlay said the Focus failed to stop at junctions, cut corners, mounting pavements in the process, and then headed across a grassed area.

As the pursuing officers considered it unsafe to follow they abandoned the chase.

But two other officers in another police vehicle picked up the Focus a short time later in The Avenue.

Faulkner again accelerated, reaching 50 miles per hour on a 30-limit road, and went the wrong way round a roundabout.

He once more mounted a pavement cutting a corner, on Tempest Road, before narrowly missing parked cars in Hawthorn Square.

It was when the Focus stopped on North Terrace that Faulkner tried to ram the police car, after it pulled up behind.

An officer getting out of the police car was injured when he was hit in the face by the door on impact, which caused £1,722 damage to the force vehicle.

Thirty-one-year-old Faulkner, of Ryton Crescent, admitted dangerous driving, driving while disqualified and criminal damage to the police car.

The court heard he has remained banned from the roads since a conviction for dangerous driving, for which he was jailed, in 2013, but his motoring offending goes back to 2004.

Jennifer Coxon, mitigating, told the court:: “He’s someone who has had a passion for fixing vehicles.”

Jailing Faulkner for a total of 27 months, Judge Christopher Prince also ordered forfeiture and destruction of the Focus, which the defendant said had already been crushed by police.

He was also banned for a further 37 months and must then sit an extended re-test to legally drive in future.