A Wem man who crashed into a motorcyclist,​ leaving him with life​ changing leg injuries, was jailed for 18 months today.

Stephen Singh, 28, of Cordwell Park, Wem, was sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court and banned from the road for three years and ​nine months.

​​Singh admitted being responsible for the crash on the afternoon of October 4 last year and driving carelessly but denied causing serious injury by dangerous driving. 

​He was convicted of causing serious injury by dangerous driving last month after a jury took just 45 minutes to reach a verdict.

Victim Deon Zwanepoel was airlifted to Stoke Hospital after the collision on the A49 but surgeons were unable to save the lower part of his right leg following crush injuries to his foot and he had the lower part of the limb amputated.

Sentencing Singh, Judge Andrew Menary, QC, said he had given “anxious consideration” to whether he could suspend the sentence but had decided “anything less than an immediate custodial sentence would fall short of appropriate punishment.”

Liverpool Crown Court heard the accident happened near Bickley when Singh overtook a bin lorry which had pulled out in front of him from Snab Lane but some distance ahead.

Mr Zwanepoel, 58, was coming the opposite way, having just negotiated a slight bend, while out for a spin on his bright orange Kawasaki motorbike and was heading towards Whitchurch – a route he had ridden many times – when he was struck.

The bin lorry driver said he had been on the road only ​a few seconds before Singh’s VW Passat overtook him and caught the motorbike a glancing blow.

Both drivers stopped and ran back to the injured man, who had been thrown from his machine.

As well as the serious right foot injury,​ he had also suffered a fractures to his left knee and left thumb and his right thumb was damaged, said Zia Chaudhry, prosecuting.

Judge Menary added that a direct result of Singh pulling out directly into the path of the victim was “he suffered very severe and life​ changing injuries.”

He said: “Despite white arrows indicating a hazard, you failed to check the road properly and assumed the road was clear…. cameras on the bin lorry showed the motorcyclist was adjacent to the lorry when you decided to overtake.”