A MOTORIST who panicked and tried to reverse his car to escape from police was jailed yesterday.

When police questioned banned driver Wayne Johnson, 34, he hurled his £45 Rover backwards into a fence, bounced back into the road and stalled the engine.

The officers ran up and snatched the keys from the ignition, and Johnson admitted: "I panicked."

Robert Terry, prosecuting, said that Johnson reversed at speed for 300m in Long Newton and lost control before hitting the fence.

He said he had just bought the car the day before for £45, and he was uninsured and disqualified, Teesside Crown Court was told.

Mr Terry said that Johnson had a substantial number of convictions for similar offences going back to the 1980s.

He was jailed for 30 months on April 30 last year for dangerous driving and two offences of driving while disqualified.

Tom Mitchell, mitigating, said: "He is absolutely realistic about this.

"He accepts the nature and quality of the sentence he will receive. He concedes it was an act of stupidity, coupled with other acts of stupidity over the years."

Before jailing Johnson, Judge Les Spittle told him: "I have got no choice in the matter."

Johnson, of Edgemoor Road, Darlington, was ordered to complete 264 days of his previous sentence, plus another five months after he pleaded guilty to driving while disqualified on November 11, and without insurance and a licence. He was already banned until 2007 and last year ordered to pass an extended test before driving again.