A speedboat owner who killed a date while showing off on the Thames was given a six year jail term today but remains on the run.
Charlotte Brown, 24, was thrown into the river after she and Jack Shepherd took his boat out onto the water during a date in December 2015.
Shepherd, of Exeter, was convicted of Ms Brown’s manslaughter by gross negligence yesterday after a jury heard the boat was speeding and had a number of defects, including faulty steering.
But the 30-year-old was not present for his trial as he has been on the run since March, having not even spoken to his mother.
Jailing him in his absence Judge Richard Marks QC said: ‘It’s entirely understandable all her family are utterly devastated by her untimely death and will no doubt grieve for the rest of their lives. No sentence I can pass is capable of bringing Charlotte back.
Miss Brown, pictured left, was pulled from the water after the crash but died from cold water immersion during a date with Jack Shepherd (right). He has since gone on the run but was jailed for six years today with his sentence to start when he is caught
Charlotte’s father Graham Brown, sister Katie and mother Roz Wicken (pictured left to right) arrive at the Old Bailey today and urged Shepherd to hand himself in
Charlotte Brown, left, pictured with her sister Katie at a wedding earlier this year. Charlotte died after a date went horribly wrong
Judge Marks QC said Shepherd should not have allowed Charlotte to drive at night, without a life jacket, and after the pair had been drinking.
He added ‘The venture on to the Thames was to end in tragedy.
‘It’s clear the boat should never have been taken out at night due to the hazards in the water, let alone allowing Charlotte to drive.
‘The defendant should never have allowed Charlotte to drive the boat and especially given the fact she had been drinking, he must have known the river was potentially hazardous.
‘This was an accident waiting to happen. The defendant had a a cavalier attitude towards safety.
‘I accept he was genuinely remorseful but it is unfortunate that remorse was not brought out in court or by him tending guilty pleas to this offence.’
Shepherd’s barrister Stephen Vullo QC said his client’s failure to attend court was due to his ‘cowardice’.
‘It’s cowardice. It is not some clever trick to avoid justice,’ he said.
‘He could not have faced the Brown family from the dock and it’s cowardice he could not do so.’
Mr Vullo said Shepherd got married to a childhood friend very shortly after the speedboat crash and now has a two-year-old child.
However, the relationship broke down and Shepherd has struggled to gain work because of his drinking and links to the case.
She filmed part of the ride on her phone, pictured, during which she is heard screaming ‘Oh my god, you’re going so fast’
Before his sentencing today Ms Brown’s sister Katie urged him to hand himself in.
In a statement on behalf of the family, she said: ‘The immense pain and anguish we feel will never pass and our grief will last a lifetime.’
She added: ‘We now appeal to Jack Shepherd wherever he is in the world to return and assume the responsibility of his guilt and the devastation he caused by his actions that fateful night – we appeal to Jack Shepherd’s family and friends to appeal to him and urge him to face the consequences of his actions.’
According to police, Shepherd was last seen in Devon in March and police have urged the public to come forward with information.
A jury at the Old Bailey had heard Shepherd, 30, had bought the red 14ft Fletcher Arrowflyte GTO boat from Gumtree to ‘pull women’.
He met Miss Brown on dating website OK Cupid and they shared two bottles of wine over dinner at The Oblix restaurant before taking to the river in December 2015, bringing champagne with them.
Jack Shepher, pictured, 30, has been convicted of the manslaughter of Charlotte Brown after his speedboat crashed while they were on a date on the Thames
In the video she made on their way up the Thames to the Houses of Parliament, Ms Brown could be heard yelling: ‘Oh my God, you’re going so fast’.
The boat then hit a partially submerged tree trunk, catapulting the couple into the freezing Thames.
Police said Shepherd was ‘desperate to show off’ and in handing over the controls to an inexperienced person he created a ‘recipe for disaster’.
Charlotte’s mother, Roz Wickens, said: ‘There are no words in the universe to describe how wonderful Charlotte was. [She was] the best daughter ever, my best friend. We’ll never get over losing her.
‘Life won’t be the same. Every breath that I take, is a guilty breath, that I’m taking breath and she’s not.’
Shepherd managed to cling onto the upturned bow and call for help, but Ms Brown, known to her friends and family as Charli, was unresponsive when she was pulled from the water.
Neither were wearing lifejackets and the speedboat had serious defects including a ‘wobble’ in the steering system and damaged windscreen and seats.
The boat was also not fitted with a ‘kill cord’ which cuts the engines in the event of an accident.
Shepherd told police in his interview that two lifejackets were aboard the vessel but that he did not tell Miss Brown about them.
In tears, he added: ‘I didn’t even ask her if she could swim’.
Jurors today took just over 25 hours to find Shepherd guilty of gross negligence manslaughter by a majority of 11 to one.
In a note accompanying the verdict, they called for ‘a high level review’ of the lack of safety regulations on the waterway.
‘We are concerned that the current lack of licensing, enforcement of regulation regarding private boat ownership on the Thames, and lack of clarity regarding safety matters greatly increases the risk of further incidents, and would hope that the result of this case will lead to a high level review of such matters going forward,’ the five men and seven women wrote.
The speedboat pictured on the River Thames bank after the fatal incident
The Common Serjeant, Judge Richard Marks QC, told Shepherd’s barrister: ‘The jury don’t know this, but I think it is appropriate now that the verdict is in that the jury should be aware that the reason why the defendant has not been in attendance over the last nearly four weeks of this trial is because he has absconded.
‘He was on unconditional bail and he chose not to attend.
‘The jury should also know that he has been in fairly constant contact with you instructing solicitors in the currency of the trial and I think it is appropriate, rather than proceeding immediately to sentence given that he will no doubt very quickly learn of the verdict of the jury to give him an opportunity to attend for sentence.’
Shepherd will be sentenced tomorrow morning.
He has not been in touch with his mother since then and told his legal team in May he had no intention of turning up to his trial.
The court heard he had been in touch with his legal team via the phone, but police have been unable to track him down and do not know what country he is in.
Shepherd, pictured at a previous hearing, was ‘desperate to show off’, police said after the trial
They have no idea whether he is even in the country but the court heard they have remained in frequent contact with him, sending him notes on the trial every day.
Shepherd had been due to appear in court last month for a separate offence and there is a warrant outstanding for his arrest in connection with that matter.
Speaking after the conviction, investigating officer, DS Christopher Davies from the Homicide and Major Crime Command said: ‘Although Shepherd had been drinking excessively he knew what he was doing and was desperate to show off his speedboat in a vain attempt to impress young women.
‘He waited for the highest tide to enable faster speeds. He brazenly offered over the controls of his defective vessel to a woman who had no previous experience with boats.
‘To do this at night, whilst drinking and driving erratically in winter conditions without offering the passenger a life jacket or asking if they could swim was a recipe for disaster.
‘Sadly it did end in tragedy for Charli. Our thoughts are with her family at this difficult time.’
Prosecutor Aftab Jafferjee said Shepherd used the speedboat as part of his ‘seduction routine’ and he may have taken up to ten women on a trip up the river.
Amy Warner, another of Shepherd’s dates, said she had to tell him to slow down on her speedboat trip and he was pulled over by the river police for going too fast.
The speedboat capsized opposite Plantation Wharf, near Wandsworth Bridge and Shepherd was found clinging to upturned bow of the boat.
The speedboat, pictured, had serious defects including a ‘wobble’ in the steering system and damaged windscreen and seats
The jury heard Shepherd bought the red 14ft Fletcher Arrowflyte GTO boat, pictured, from Gumtree to ‘pull women’
He was unsteady on his feet and still reeked of alcohol after lifeguards hauled him from the river.
Shepherd, from Abergavenny, Wales, was slurring is words as he asked: ‘Is she alright? Have you found her?’.
Riverside resident Steven Morrissey told the court that he heard a young man screaming for help.
He said in a statement: ‘He kept saying ‘Help me, help me, somebody help me’. It was just ‘Help me’ – not ‘us’, or ‘her’.’
When he took Charlotte out on December 8 2015, just hours after they met for the first time, ‘it went horribly wrong,’ Mr Jafferjee said.
‘It was cold, it was dark, we submit, it was sheer madness.’
The speedboat capsized opposite Plantation Wharf, near Wandsworth Bridge and Shepherd was found clinging to upturned bow of the boat.
He was unsteady on his feet and still reeked of alcohol after lifeguards hauled him from the river.
He told officers they drank two bottles of wine before taking taxi to his houseboat where they ‘drank more and decided to go out on the boat’ up towards Westminster with some more wine.
Miss Brown’s parents Graham Brown (left) and Roz Wickens, have been at the trial throughout
‘On the way back she wanted a go,’ Shepherd recalled.
‘She was quite insistent on it. I had said that she could, so it was hard to go back on it.
‘So, I got to a straight stretch where I considered it to be safe and we swapped.
‘The water would have been calm. I remember hanging on to the bar in front of the passenger seat.
‘I don’t normally have to do that. I normally just sit there and relax. The last thing I remember was hanging on.’
An officer asked about what kind of speed Ms Brown was doing, to which he replied: ‘Full throttle to have to be hanging on, and maybe steering slightly erratically.
‘We must have hit something, or she cornered quickly.’
He added: ‘Neither of us wore life jackets although there were two in between the seats.
‘But she would not have known they were there and I didn’t point them out. I didn’t even ask if she could swim.’
Shepherd added: ‘In the past, with other girlfriends, I have done the right thing about letting them know about the life jackets, although not suggesting they actually wear it.’
He was previously stopped in the boat on August 22, 2015, on his way to The Shard where he was taking Ms Warner for a meal at a nearby restaurant.
She told the court: ‘He was driving quite fast.
In an unprecedented move, prosecutors brought the speedboat to the Old Bailey for the jury to inspect
‘Obviously, from the other surrounding boat traffic coming towards us the water was quite choppy. I asked Jack to slow down.
‘In comparison to the slower boats, I guess tourist boats, on the river at the time it did feel a lot faster than that.’
The court heard Shepherd agreed to slow down and the boat was subsequently pulled over by marine police units ‘about the speed’.
When they arrived at the restaurant Ms Warner said the pair ordered a bottle of wine with their dinner.
‘I noticed he was a lot more tipsy than I was,’ she commented of Shepherd’s state during the meal.
A few weeks later, on September 10, three months before the fatal accident, marine units again pulled Shepherd over for speeding.
Mr Jafferjee said it was again pointed out to him that although not a requirement, life jackets were an important piece of safety equipment.
A similar observation was made regarding the kill cord, jurors heard.
‘As you know, none of these warnings were ever heeded,’ Mr Jafferjee said.
He denied manslaughter by gross negligence but was convicted in his absence.