THE Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has defended itself after being criticised by a driver cleared of causing a child’s death through dangerous driving near York.

No evidence was offered against Patrick Veitch, 49, of Fulford, at York Crown Court, and he claimed afterwards that the CPS had received evidence in May 2017 demonstrating he was not the cause of the A64 accident but ‘chose not to engage with this until only a few weeks ago, greatly prolonging matters for all parties.’

Now the CPS has said: “This was a complex, fatal road traffic incident which involved expert evidence from a number of sources. The CPS received one defence report in 2017 and took full account of its content when reaching our decision to charge.

“Further expert evidence was received in July and August 2018 and a meeting was arranged to enable the experts to discuss their individual findings.

“As a result of this meeting further expert opinion was sought. This was received on September 17 2018 at which time we promptly reviewed the case and concluded we no longer had a realistic prospect of conviction.”