SENTENCING STATEMENTS

On sentencing Lord Arthurson made the following remarks in court:

Stephen McGovern was born on 7 September 2001.  He was a beloved son and brother, and a loving father to his young son.  Mr McGovern died on 4 July 2023 at the age of 21.  He worked in Edinburgh.  His family members have provided impact statements to the court, each of which I have personally read with care.  Mr McGovern’s death at such a young age, with all of his life stretching out ahead of him, has been and will continue to be profoundly felt by all of his family and his many friends.  The impact of his passing in particular upon his young child is and will be simply incalculable.

Evan Davis, on 11 June 2025 at Edinburgh High Court, you tendered a plea of guilty to a single charge section 76 indictment libelling an offence of causing the death of Mr McGovern by your dangerous driving on 4 July 2023 on the Calder Road, Edinburgh, contrary to section 1 of the Road Traffic Act 1988.

A truly shocking piece of footage of this crime was played in court on the date of your plea.  A full narrative was read into the court record.  No previous convictions were tendered because you have none.  You are presently aged 22.  You were aged 20 as at the date of the index offence.

At around 0655 hours on 4 July 2023 you carried out two undertaking manoeuvres at speed on the westbound carriageway of the Calder Road.  You were, on your own account, driving to Aberdeen in connection with your work, and you were behind schedule.  Your view of the carriageway ahead was unimpeded.  You failed to observe your victim, Mr McGovern, who was at that point in time a pedestrian on the carriageway, and you struck him with your vehicle, thereby causing his death.  He was, as the footage so graphically disclosed, thrown into the air. His injuries were assessed by the emergency services to be non‑survivable.  It is considered that he would have died when he collided with the road.  His life was pronounced extinct at 0737 hours.

In the 4 seconds prior to driving your vehicle into collision with Mr McGovern, you accelerated from 53.4mph to 62.1mph.  The speed limit was 40mph.  You were in a hurry.  You were running late.  Your time was more important to you than the welfare of your fellow road users.  As a result of your dangerous driving, arising as it did due to your desire to make up time in your schedule, you killed Mr McGovern.

You now have to live with that.  On 4 July 2023 when you were taken by police officers to Livingston Police Office, you asked the officers:  “How am I going to live with this?”  In due course this morning I may be able to offer you some suggestions by way of answer to that question, genuinely asked by you then, and I believe, on the information available to me today, some 2 years on, a question genuinely asked by you of yourself on a daily basis.

You should understand that, due to the gravity of the offence before the court today, custody is inevitable.  You have, since this appalling crime, acted well and with integrity.  You called the emergency services yourself at the scene.  You expressed immediate remorse.  You have pled guilty at a relatively early stage in these proceedings using accelerated procedure to do so.  You have accepted full responsibility throughout.  The empathy demonstrated by you for your victim, his family and in particular for his young child, is in my assessment wholehearted and authentic.  Your senior counsel has touched upon these important matters in the course of his submissions in mitigation advanced on your behalf this morning.  I take into account everything that has been said by him and note additionally the points which he has made regarding the offence itself, your stable employment history, your wholly pro-social background and extended family, including your relationship with your partner and responsibilities to your son, your early diagnosis of ADHD and the terms of Professor MacPherson’s recent report regarding features of your mental health.           .

I have additionally noted the terms of the character references and various further medical reports which have been tendered to the court by your lawyers in advance of this sentencing hearing.

Notwithstanding the catastrophic consequences of your driving on the day in question, I take the view that this episode consisted of a single episode of dangerous driving, comprising the undertaking manoeuvres to which I have referred followed by your continuing to drive at excessive and accelerating speed into collision with your victim, whose presence on the carriageway you should surely have noticed, all in the course of your second undertaking manoeuvre.  He was, of course, a pedestrian, although it cannot be disputed that his presence on the carriageway would have been entirely unexpected by drivers at that locus. No other aggravating features are present.  You called the emergency services and remained at the scene. You fully cooperated with the police and expressed immediate remorse.  You had a clean driving record. These are mitigatory features.  I accordingly, under reference to the relevant sentencing guideline, place your driving within but towards the lower end of level of seriousness B.  I should add for completeness that the Young People Sentencing Guideline is engaged in this case, albeit that you are now aged 22.

In the whole circumstances I now sentence you as follows.  I select a headline custodial disposal of 5 years imprisonment.  Due to the timing and utility of your guilty plea I confirm that you will serve a period of 45 months imprisonment in respect of this indictment.  Critical factors in the selection of these headline and discounted tariffs are your status as a first offender, your genuine remorse and hitherto wholly pro‑social life and circumstances, together with your age at the time of the index offence and your age today. The discount to which you are entitled due to your early plea is marginally reduced due to the gap between your first appearance on petition in October 2024 and your section 76 letter which was not signed until May 2025.

In addition, you will be disqualified from holding or obtaining a driving licence for a period of 5 years, which period includes the additional custody‑related period required under section 35C of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988. At the end of that period you will require to re-sit an extended test of driving competence.,

These disposals will each run from today.

I return now, finally, to the question that you put to police officers on 4 July 2023, namely “How am I going to live with this?”  I would suggest, and this is of course a matter entirely for you and your conscience, that you adopt the following course.  Approach your sentence of imprisonment as constructively as you can.  Remember that at the conclusion of that sentence you will one day walk out of prison and return to your family and resume your life.  Remember that Mr McGovern, due to your criminal behaviour behind the wheel of your vehicle on 4 July 2023, can and will never do so.  Live your life well, and perhaps undertake future voluntary work in the community, in memory of your victim.  And, after all of that, most importantly, continue to remember Stephen McGovern’s mother, his siblings, and, above all, his young son.