Audi Driver’s Road Rage Row led to Mother-of-two’s Death

An Audi driver from Huddersfield has been jailed for three years for causing the death of a mother-of-two after she tailgated him during a road rage row.

Bradford Crown Court heard how 38-year-old Isma Nawaz died in a car crash after she had been involved in aggressive driving with 27-year-old Mohammed Abbas.

Isma was on her way to work at a petrol station in Burley-in-Wharfedale when she and Abbas engaged in a road rage row.

A judge was told how the mum from Bradford lost control of her Vauxhall Astra on Harrogate Road, Apperley Bridge, in June 2020 and crashed into a parked Ford Focus.

Isma Nawaz, who had two young daughters and was described as “a diamond”, died at the scene.

Although Mohammed Abbas drove away in his Audi, Judge Jonathan Rose said he could not be sure the defendant had been aware of the collision.

Mohammed Abbas was later arrested in connection with the fatal incident and eventually pleaded guilty in 2021 to an offence of causing death by dangerous driving.

The Audi driver, who had a speeding offence from 2018 on his record, was jailed for three years and banned from driving for a total of five-and-a-half years.

Judge Rose was shown CCTV clips that showed Isma Nawaz driving closely behind Abbas’ Audi A3.

In his basis of plea, the driver said he had been “tailgated” by the Astra and Isma Nawaz had also tried to undertake his car.

In jailing the Audi driver, Judge Rose said there was no doubt that the victim’s death was “entirely avoidable and entirely unnecessary”.

He said neither driver had any reason to be driving at excessive speed on their way to work that morning nor was there a reason for “racing or challenging” each other.

Judge Rose said:

“The driving of each of you, I must say, was wholly without justification.”

The judge said on a two-lane stretch of the road they had driven in an “aggressive and combative manner” with another motorist describing them as “idiots”.

Abbas claimed that he had been dabbing his brakes to get the Astra to slow down, but Judge Rose suggested that may have caused Isma to make a sudden steering manoeuvre.

Judge Rose said he accepted that Abbas had expressed remorse and that the incident had had an impact on his mental health.

He said Isma Nawaz’s death had deprived her husband, parents, siblings and children of their “diamond”.