Beverly Hills crash: Jordan Tye Maaka granted bail after crashing Honda Accord

A learner driver who lost control and a smashed into a power pole in a horror crash allegedly got behind the wheel while his license was suspended due to unpaid fines, a court heard.

Jordan Tye Maaka, 18, was charged with dangerous driving occasioning grievous bodily harm, negligent driving causing grievous bodily harm, three counts of causing injury while in charge of motor vehicle and driving while suspended.

His four teenage passengers were seriously injured after his Honda Accord crashed while coming around a bend on Stoney Creek Road, Beverly Hills, in Sydney’s south on Friday morning.  

The crash was eerily similar to the one that tragically killed five students in Buxton southwest of Sydney just ten days earlier.

Police at a Parramatta Bail Court hearing on Sunday alleged that Maaka ‘was consuming alcohol while driving’, at the time of the crash.

But Magistrate Sharon Holdsworth admonished the investigator’s claims calling their evidence ‘poorly drafted’ and granting bail ahead of his next court appearance this week 

‘There’s no evidence to substantiate speed or the consumption of alcohol,’ she told the court, The Daily Telegraph reported.

‘I can see no evidence pointing to the misconduct of the individual (Maaka) while in charge of the motor vehicle.’

Maaka appeared at the hearing via video link from his hospital bed, where he was under police guard and suffering from a range of injuries including a broken arm.

‘It is only through sheer good luck that the collision did not result in the death of all five teenagers,’ the police fact sheet stated. 

The police prosecutor opposed Maaka’s application for bail, telling the court he had a suspended licence at the time of the crash due to unpaid fines.

An 18-year-old man has been charged over the crash in Beverly Hills last Friday. Pictured is the Honda Accord at the scene

The prosecutor also referenced the recent fatal crash in Buxton.

He also alleged Maaka was speeding and used a Google Maps image to show showed the distance between the bend and the house the car crashed into.

Magistrate Holdsworth acknowledged while the scale of the impact may give rise to speeding ‘I don’t accept that by looking at Google Maps’.

Maaka under his bail conditions must be accompanied his mother whenever leaving the house, unless he is going to his job loading trucks in a furniture factory.

He will appear in Sutherland Local Court on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, three of the four passengers remain in hospital two days after crash.

Two female passengers, both aged 16, were taken to St George Hospital in stable conditions.

One of the girls is understood to have hip and chest injuries, while the other female has a head injury. 

Two male passengers, aged 15 and 16, were also treated at the scene and taken to Liverpool Hospital in stable conditions. One has since been released.

Four teenage passengers were injured in the crash, while the driver suffered a broken arm 

Witnesses told Daily Mail Australia on Friday that the alleged driver wandered around, dazed and agitated, immediately after the crash, muttering ‘What have I done? What have I done?’ 

The two female passengers were lying on the footpath beside the car, one unable to speak while the other screamed out with a bleeding cut on her neck.

Glen Norrish, who lives in the house in front of where the car crashed, said he was woken just after 5.30am by an ‘almighty bang’ and wandered out to see the alleged driver, the two injured girls and another young man sitting by his letterbox, leaning against the fence with his leg bleeding.

Beverly Hills resident Glen Norrish described the chaotic scene of the accident that occurred in front of his house on Stoney Creek Rd at 5.30am on Friday morning

Mr Norrish said another young man was stuck in the middle of the back seat.

‘The car was sort of smoking, I was ready to grab the fire extinguisher,’ Mr Norrish said.

Mr Norrish said he told the two girl teenagers to stay awake. 

‘One had a pretty bad cut on her neck, the other was just laying there and I kept on saying ‘keep your eyes open’.

‘This is a bad stretch of road but (I believe) speed was involved.

‘The girl with the cut on her neck who was screaming, I think she also hurt her neck.

‘The damage on that fence, they were going fast.’

Mr Norrish said the car hit a tree and then the brick fence of the house next door, sending brick fragments flying into his house.

He said the second girl on the ground had an injured hip and couldn’t walk.

‘They looked really young, they were just dressed casually.

‘I thought straight away maybe one of the three in the back was wearing a seat belt.

‘The driver would have been saved by the air bags.

‘There’s no gutter where the car hit and it would have just been flying up the road.

‘It’s about 12 months since they made this a clearway and there’s trucks and semis speeding up the road all the time.

‘We need speed cameras here bad.’

The magistrate said there was no evidence to support claims by police the alleged driver had been speeding or affected by alcohol (pictured firefighters at Beverly Hills crash scene)

NSW Police Assistant Commissioner Brett McFadden said the said about the eerie similarity of the Beverly Hills crash with the one at Buxton.

‘We have a direct correlation with what happened just days ago at Buxton,’ Asst Cmnr McFadden ‘We are most fortunate we didn’t lose another five lives.

‘We shouldn’t be aspiring to be driving like these absolute idiots on the road. 

‘We need to make sure that as a community, we are doing everything we can to prevent these incidents taking place.’ 

 The alleged driver of the Beverly Hills crash (pictured) was granted bail on Sunday

Two female passengers, both aged 16, and two male passengers, aged 15 and 16, were taken to hospital with serious injuries 

NSW Ambulance Inspector Anna Lennard told the St George and Sutherland Shire Leader that said the two females were in the back seat with one of the males, who became trapped in the accident.

‘Emergency crews worked to free him, while paramedics and the aeromedical team treated the other patients on the side of the road,’ she said.  

‘Incidents involving young people are always confronting for our crews. We’ve recently seen a terrible tragedy on our roads and we encourage everyone to drive safely.’ 

The crash at Beverley Hills occurred 10 days after five teens were killed at Buxton (pictured)

Friends gather at the scene at Buxton, in Sydney’s south-west, where five classmates from Picton High School aged between 14 and 16 were killed in a horror crash on September 6

The incident comes just days after a horror smash at Buxton near Picton in Sydney’s south-west that killed five teens aged between 14 and 16.

Tyrell Edwards, 18, faces five charges of dangerous driving after his five passengers, were killed in the high-speed crash on the night of September 6.

The three girls and two boys killed in the accident were all friends from Picton High School.

Antonio Desisto, Tyrese Bechard, Summer Williams, Lily Van De Putte and Gabriella McLennan – all aged between 14 and 16 – died when a Nissan Navara ute veered off the road in Buxton. 

The driver, Edwards, escaped the smash with non life-threatening injuries and remains behind bars.

The final two funerals of the victims will be held on Monday.