• Family's anger as hit-and-run driver walks free from court
  • Life-long driving ban but 20-month jail sentence suspended
  • Judge: Fayer's actions were “cowardly, deceitful, disgusting"
  • Driver 'never attempted to stop', prosecution tells court

A DRIVER who killed a pedestrian before fleeing the scene to cover up his crime has walked free from court.

Cyril Fayers, 90, “lied and lied and lied” to try and get away with causing the death of a loving wife and mother.

Barbara Cyfrowicz, 54, was using a pedestrian crossing on Frinton Road, Kirby Cross, on her way to the shops when she was hit.

Carolyn Gardiner, prosecuting said: “A car drove onto the crossing colliding with her.

“It threw her in the air and onto the ground.

“The man never attempted to stop. No brake lights were seen and the car continued to drive towards Frinton.”

While Mrs Cyfrowicz, of Bemerton Gardens, fought for her life Fayers was planting evidence and hiding his car.

She died two days after the crash.

Miss Gardiner told the court Fayers called his family and said a piece of concrete and fallen off a bridge in Little Bentley and hit his car.

In the meantime Fayers, of Wittonwood Road, had gone to a family home, selected a lump of concrete and planted it into the grill of his car.

The car was put into a barn until repairs could be carried out.

Gazette:

  • Flowers were left at the crossing where Mrs Cyfrowicz was run over

Fayers, a former probation officer and part-time DJ, was visited by police who were speaking to all owners of red Peugeots in Frinton.

He told officers a family member had the car at the time of the crash and had taken it to Ireland.

Later he claimed, during interview, the car was damaged by concrete falling from the bridge.

All were lies.

The crash took place on December 26, 2014.

Fayers admitted causing death by careless driving, perverting the course of justice, failing to stop and failing to report a crash almost a year later, on December 21, last year.

Evelyn Hicks, mitigating, said: “He accepts he did hit something but did not know what he struck.”

She told the court he began to “weave a web of untruths to his family and police” which he couldn’t unravel.

She added: “He accepts what he has done is so tragic and so horrific the family will not get over this.”

Judge Patricia Lynch QC, at Chelmsford Crown Court today sentenced him to a total of 20 months in jail - eight months for causing death by careless driving and 12 months for perverting the course of justice.

However the sentence was suspended for two years.

Fayers was banned from driving for life.

Gazette:

  • Victim: Mrs Cyfrowicz when she was younger

Judge Lynch said: “You are a man who has reached 90 who has led a blameless life until this incident.

“Your behaviour thereafter was cowardly, it was deceitful, it was manipulative, in short, disgusting.

“You must know that.”

She told the family she sentenced “with a heavy heart” but said “my job is to dispense justice to all parties” and decided not to send him to jail and cause him to lose his home.

The court also heard evidence he was not allowed to drive without glasses.

It was alleged he was not wearing them at the time of the crash but this could not be proved.

Judge Lynch said: “He said he was, but it has to be said he has lied and lied and lied.”

Gazette:

  • The funeral cortege at the crossing where Mrs Cyfrowicz was knocked down

Speaking after the sentence outside court Det Con Natasha Brown, on behalf of the family, said: “Cyril Fayers has shown no remorse. This has been life changing for us and our extended family.

“This has been particularly hard on her husband Graham and son James.”

Cousin Robert Curry added: “It is horrendous. It was not the fact he ran her over but he tried to cover everything up in the way a murderer would.

“He still should have got a custodial sentence.

“It was clear she felt sorry for him because he would lose his house. Well, so what?”

  • The scene of the tragedy