A JUDGE said it was ‘a marvel’ that no-one was killed after a van driven by a man high on valium was spotted on the wrong side of the A595.

An off-duty police office captured the frightening sight on his car’s dashcam before 35-year-old Craig Davison crashed on to a roundabout near Whitehaven.

A passing doctor stopped to see if the driver and his passenger needed help, but they ‘appeared to be wanting to get away from the scene’, Carlisle Crown Court was told.

Davison was later described as being agitated as he was taken into police custody.

As he sent the driver to prison, the judge - Recorder Christopher Hudson - told him that anyone travelling in the opposite direction to his van would have been “absolutely petrified” by his bad driving.

And he said: “It is a mercy that nobody was either killed or seriously injured.”

The off-duty police officer's dashcam footage showed Davison’s Citroen Berlingo straying on to the opposite side of the A595 at Howgate, near Whitehaven, in the early hours of July 9.

The officer turned around and discovered 35-year-old Davison’s van had careered on to a roundabout.

“It would appear the vehicle was driven on to the roundabout, colliding with signs and other items as it went,” prosecutor Gerard Rogerson told Carlisle Crown Court.

Davison and his passenger partner declined the medical assistance of a doctor who stopped at the scene.

“Mr Davison and his partner appeared to be wanting to get away from the scene as if - to use the doctor’s words - they had done something wrong,” added Mr Rogerson.

Alcohol and drug-wipe tests proved negative but Davison was arrested. The prosecutor added: “He is described as being agitated and aggressive in the (police) van, and banging around in the back on the way to custody.”

Davison, of Udale Court, Moorclose, told a probation officer he’d taken valium along with prescribed methadone before he admitted dangerous driving.

Brendan Burke, defending, said of the valium admission: “The only evidence we have about that is because he told the probation service. I invite the court to view that favourably because I am conscious when both parties read the (case) papers there was curiosity about how this happened.”

Recorder Christopher Hudson jailed Davison for eight months, and banned him from driving for 18 months.