A MAN caught by police doing 115mph in Bradford city centre while more than three times the drug driving limit has been jailed for just 28 days.

Rayhan Rashid, 26, was seen by an officer conducting speed checks at the junction of Canal Road and Valley Road just after midnight on June 22 last year.

He was driving a grey BMW that was approaching the officer with a VW Golf, with both cars overtaking one another as they sped towards the junction.

Prosecutor Alicia Kaye told Bradford Crown Court that the cars were clocked doing 115mph in a 40mph zone, with the officer stating that both vehicles were “still accelerating” as they continued away from the area.

After he decided to give chase, the Golf disappeared, but Rashid was tracked heading towards Shipley at speeds of around 90mph. As the pursuit continued, Rashid turned into Frizinghall Road, overtaking a car waiting to turn left.

He accelerated away from the pursuing officer once again before suddenly pulling over to the side of the road and stopping.

As the officer approached the BMW, he could smell cannabis.

He performed a roadside drug wipe test, and Rashid’s reading was three-and-a-half times the legal limit for the drug.

Rashid appeared before magistrates in January where he pleaded guilty to dangerous driving and driving over the prescribed drug limit, also receiving an interim driving ban.

Angus MacDonald, mitigating, said his client’s actions were an “unacceptable piece of driving”, with a custodial sentence inevitable. But he argued that any prison sentence could be suspended, stating that the police chase was not “prolonged”, with Rashid, of Glenrose Drive, Lidget Green, Bradford, stopping after only a short distance.

Of the other car involved, he said: “This was not racing, the other vehicle was coming at speed and he was trying to get away from it.”

Mr MacDonald added that Rashid, who had no previous convictions, had given up his job to become the registered carer for his father, who he said suffered from various “serious ailments”, affecting both his physical and mental health.

Judge Colin Burn said Rashid’s driving was aggravated by the fact he was “intoxicated” with cannabis.

He said: “I have to sentence you for driving at insanely high speeds on Canal Road, admittedly at night. The minimum you were doing at one point was 115mph. Other vehicles driving sensibly on the road would have been terrified at seeing someone flying past them at that speed.

“This was an accident waiting to happen. There could be no excuse for driving in this way.”

Judge Burn said he had to take into account the fact that Rashid’s “very ill” father relied heavily on him, but said he also had to consider the “plague of fast, dangerous drivers” coming through Bradford’s courts.

Stating that immediate custody was “unavoidable”, Judge Burn said that after a trial Rashid would have been facing a sentence of six weeks. With one-third credit for his early guilty plea, this was reduced to 28 days, with a 12-month driving ban.

Rashid was caught by officers involved in Operation Steerside, the district-wide road safety crackdown by West Yorkshire Police, just days before the 10,000th driver was snared by the campaign. At the time, Sergeant Cameron Buchan, the officer leading Steerside, which has now caught more than 12,000 illegal motorists, described the behaviour of the 115mph drivers as “simply astonishing.”

Commenting on the case, a spokesman for Brake, the road safety charity, said: “Breaking the speed limit by any amount is dangerous, but travelling at over 100mph and up to 114mph while under the influence of drugs is putting the driver and other road users in grave danger.

“We need tougher sentencing to provide a real deterrent to dangerous law-breaking drivers and investment in road traffic enforcement to be made a national policing priority.”

A spokesman for the charity IAM RoadSmart added: “Only the courts can take all the factors behind a case into consideration when sentencing, but they should also be aware that most drivers take this sort of behaviour very seriously. In a recent survey, 64 per cent of drivers told us they thought drug driving had got worse in the last three years and 66 per cent thought it a very serious threat to their personal safety. It is therefore important that the courts support police and reflect the worries of society when sentencing.”