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Cambridgeshire hit-and-run crashes: Mother says family 'destroyed'

Family handout Paul Wood, with his mother HelenFamily handout
Paul Wood, pictured with his mother Helen on her 50th birthday, was killed on the A505 near the Imperial War Museum at Duxford

The mother of a motorcyclist killed in a hit-and-run nine months after his friend died in a similar crash said her family felt "absolutely destroyed".

Paul Wood, 23, was killed on his way to work as a hospital chef in 2019 on the A505 in Cambridgeshire.

His friend Mathew Smyth, 25, died in 2018 when he was hit by a courier who initially claimed he had struck a deer.

Helen Wood said her son, whose killer is due to be sentenced on Friday, used to visit Mr Smyth's grave daily.

She said the pair had been friends for nearly two decades and used to go out on their motorbikes together.

Mr Smyth, from Duxford, was an expectant father when he was killed by a van driver who pulled out into his path on the A1307 near Linton in Cambridgeshire.

The driver, Ricardas Taraska of Norwich, who was 23 when sentenced in 2018, was jailed for 14 months.

Cambridgeshire Police Mathew SmythCambridgeshire Police
Mathew Smyth had been expecting a child with his partner when he died in a crash

Mrs Wood said she was on holiday when Mr Smyth died and took a phone call from her son, who was "so upset".

"He just said 'mum, Matt's dead', and I said 'what do you mean Matt's dead?' and I couldn't work it out myself. He then told me what happened to Matt," she said.

"Paul used to go to the cemetery every single day. At some point through the day he would say 'I'm just going to pop to the cemetery and see Matt'.

"Then it happened to Paul."

Family handout Paul Wood with his mother and sistersFamily handout
Paul Wood, pictured with his three sisters and mother, was a "happy-go-lucky young man [who] wanted to make people laugh", said Mrs Wood

Mr Wood, whose mother described him as "everything you'd want in a son", was killed on the A505 near Fowlmere, Cambridgeshire on 24 May 2019.

When asked what the impact of his death was on her family, Mrs Wood said: "Total destruction, absolutely destroyed us."

In March, disqualified driver Heath Cooksey, 53, of St Neots Road in Romford, east London, was found guilty of causing Mr Wood's death by careless driving, and is due to be sentenced at Cambridge Crown Court on Friday.

Cooksey also admitted failing to stop at the scene of a collision. Mrs Wood said he "left my son lying in the road".

Mrs Wood is part of the Roads Injustice Project, started up by Mr Smyth's mother, which aims to raise awareness of road safety and calls for tougher sentences for hit-and-run drivers.

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