In this deeply moving and honest blog, Janice Brown shares her story; reflecting on the devastating loss of her brother, Ronald, killed by a dangerous driver. Janice reflects on her grief for Ronald, the further effects the collision had and still has on her life, and her feelings towards the perpetrator. Finally, she explains how through RoadPeace, she has found a safe space. If you too are grieving a loved one killed in a road traffic collision, please do call our helpline on 0800 160 1069, we are here to listen and support.
My biggest concerns on April 3rd 2020, were whether my then-partner, S, and I would be able to go on the holiday we’d booked to Tenerife, and how I’d look in a bikini. That afternoon, my big brother Ronald, (DJ), called me and we spoke for 35 minutes and 35 seconds. The last thing we said to each other before ending the call was, “I love you.” Later, I settled down in front of the TV with a bottle of Guinness Hop House before heading to bed. Friday, April 3rd 2020, even though it was far from normal due to the pandemic, was to be the final normal day of my life.
I was woken in the early hours of April 4th by our Alexa announcing that someone was at the front door. I opened my eyes to see blue flashing lights shining through the curtains. S went downstairs to answer the door. Thinking it was an ambulance crew who had got the wrong house I stayed in bed initially, but a sixth sense told me to go downstairs. S was standing at the front door with a police officer and turned to me, saying, “It’s for you.”
Still only half awake, I was confused. Why was a police officer asking for me? The officer looked at me.
“Are you Janice Brown?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know Ronald Brown?”
“Yes, that’s my brother.”
“Do you know Merline Brown?”
“Yes, that’s my mum.”
“There’s been an incident…” the officer began, then corrected himself “…an accident.”
It dawned on me, and I steeled myself.
“I’m afraid Ronald has passed away.”
My legs went from under me.
I don’t remember very much of the rest of the conversation. I needed to get to our mum, who DJ had lived with all his life. The news had been broken to her, but she was refusing to let the officers enter her house, and had asked them to contact me. In tears I flung on yesterday’s clothes, and was blue-lighted to Mum’s house. S woke his young son and followed in his car.
Outside Mum’s, I met Sarah, our Family Liaison Officer (FLO), who explained what was known so far of what had happened. Another vehicle had been involved in the collision. DJ had been driving through a crossroad junction when his car was hit on the passenger side. It spun and hit a lamppost, before catching fire. DJ died instantly, less than a mile from home.
DJ had been a bus driver for 17 years, and a private hire taxi driver before that. So not only did he know how to drive, he earned a living from driving. I was pretty certain, even with the limited knowledge that I had, that DJ had not been responsible for the collision. The fact that DJ’s car had caught fire suggested that excessive speed had been a factor.
Sarah asked if I would rather let her tell Mum the details of what had happened, or if I wanted to tell her myself. I let Sarah tell her – I didn’t want to break Mum’s heart any more than it had already been broken.
I’d never seen Mum so distraught and devastated – she was a shell of the woman I knew. She’d always been a typical Jamaican woman, strong and fiery. She’d been widowed in the mid 70s, and had raised DJ and I as a single mother. Sarah explained as gently as she could to Mum what had happened. Because DJ had been so badly injured, it wasn’t possible for anyone to visually identify him – I gave Sarah DJ’s toothbrush and his dentist’s details so that identification could take place through DNA and dental records.
Sarah and her colleague, and S and his son left. I’d texted DJ’s daughter Shads asking her to call me urgently, and when I received her reply asking if everything was all right, it was time to make the most harrowing series of phone calls ever – first to Shads and then to my sisters in Jamaica. Then I waited, with Mum sobbing and resting her head in my lap, for a decent hour to arrive so I could call on one of DJ’s friends who lived nearby to let her know. Even though we were in lockdown, many of DJ’s friends came round to pay their respects – he was so very loved. His funeral a month later was attended by around 100 people, and there would probably have been many times that number in different circumstances.
As the police investigation continued, we learned more about the events of April 4th. My initial hunch had been correct – the other driver had run the red light at 74mph, more than double the speed limit. DJ had entered the junction lawfully, driving at 25mph. His light changed to red just after he entered the junction, so if he’d been going a little slower, he’d have stopped at the red light, and watched the other driver barrel through.
Yet more information came to light. Just before the collision, the other driver had taken a left corner so fast that the car had crossed the centre line. According to witness statements given to the police officers in attendance, the other driver had claimed that there was another passenger in his vehicle. They could also smell alcohol on his breath, and he was slurring his words. Only he had been pulled from his car, so understandably the officers were instructed to search all the gardens within a 200-metre radius for the missing passenger (there was no passenger.)
The driver was arrested on suspicion of Causing death by dangerous driving, Causing death while uninsured, and failing to provide a sample for analysis (at the sentencing hearing, police bodycam footage was shown of him verbally abusing and threatening both police officers and hospital staff.) The driver failed to attend a voluntary interview, so in the early hours of June 8th, officers went to his flat to arrest him. He brandished a machete at the officers, so tasers were drawn and aimed at him. Following his arrest, he gave a “No Comment” interview and was charged, then released on bail at Magistrates Court, despite the Senior Investigating Officer’s concerns.
He then returned to Crown Court to enter a plea. He pleaded guilty, but the judge having looked at the case, ordered him to be remanded and told his solicitor to expect him to receive a substantial custodial sentence. It was at this point – on July 6th, over 3 months after the crash – that he decided that he wanted to offer us a written apology.
I told Sarah to tell him to take his apology and stick it.
Here’s what I had to say about it in my Victim Personal Statement:
“The defendant pleaded guilty to all three charges on July 6th, 94 days after the collision. It was only then that the subject of him writing a letter to express his deep remorse came up. Given that the defendant was in hospital for 16 days afterwards, this so-called ‘deep remorse’ is still 78 days too late. Nevertheless, the definition of ‘remorse’, according to the Oxford English Dictionary is ‘deep regret or guilt for doing something morally wrong; the fact or state of feeling sorrow for committing a sin; repentance.’
“It is clear to us that the defendant’s actions in the hours, days and weeks following the collision only served to protect his own interests – so, please, let’s not talk about ‘deep remorse.’ That particular ship sailed the moment the defendant chose to get behind the wheel of his uninsured car and drive at 74 miles per hour in a 30 zone. The ship sailed into rough seas when he failed to provide a sample for analysis, leading us to believe that he was impaired through alcohol, drugs, or both, and wanted to conceal that fact. It ran aground weeks later when the defendant failed to attend a scheduled interview with the police.”
I read this statement at the sentencing hearing at Manchester Crown Court on October 21st. The statement took me 3 drafts and many hours to complete. I spoke in the witness box for 20 minutes. The following quote sums everything up:
“DJ had done nothing wrong, yet he paid the ultimate price. He was not the victim of an accident, but of an unlawful killing. He never stood a chance…It might have been different if DJ had been sick or if his body had suddenly failed him. Of course, the sadness and sense of loss would still have been there but we could honestly have said his time had come and there was nothing anyone could have done to prevent it. But this nightmare was caused solely by the deliberate, reckless, selfish actions of the defendant and could so easily have been prevented. The defendant took a gamble, and DJ – and all of us by extension – lost.”
The driver was sentenced to 7 years in prison and was subject to an 8.5 year driving ban. In his sentencing remarks, the judge noted his previous criminal history (9 prior convictions from 11 offences – no prior driving offences). He was released in 2023, a few days after the first anniversary of Mum’s passing, and the last I’d heard of him, he was swanning around one of the local pubs. I was astounded. He’d admitted to drinking between 6 and 8 bottles of Budweiser over the course of that day, hadn’t eaten anything, let his car insurance lapse, caused an unimaginable tragedy, and felt that upon his release, the best place for him to go was the pub. Had he learned exactly nothing?
The criminal case had ended, but for our family, the nightmare was as painful as ever. Mum was just broken and cried herself to sleep every night with a picture of DJ beside her. My relationship with S didn’t survive and ended a year later. There was some happiness in 2022, when Shads gave birth to a baby boy, who is the spitting image of his grandad. It was bittersweet, and many times I wished that DJ could be still here to meet his grandson. I still do. Sadly, Mum passed away at the end of 2022. She’d never been the same after DJ died, and I fully believe she died of a broken heart. Ironically, she died in the same hospital that the other driver was taken to after the crash.
I struggled to cope with so many losses within such a short time. There were so many times when something happened in my life and I’d pick up the phone to text or call Mum or DJ, then reality hit.
I felt like a gymnast trying to perform the regular cartwheels, flips and somersaults that I always had done, except instead of performing on a sturdy floor, I was doing gymnastics on rubble – trying to maintain some semblance of balance among the wreckage of my old life, and hoping that I didn’t stumble and hit rock bottom.
Some well-meaning friends said that I should try and forgive. I do not and will not forgive – his initial choice to drive after having consumed excess alcohol; his conduct at the scene, causing police to hunt for a non-existent passenger; him refusing to provide a sample when requested and the verbal abuse of the medical staff that had effectively saved his life; his skipping out on the police interview; his threatening the police with a machete; the “No Comment” interview, and finally the “apology” that was too little, too late – all this has made forgiveness a non-starter in my book. I am still angry that my brother met a violent, brutal and needless death because of the poor choices of another individual.
I’d first contacted RoadPeace towards the end of 2020 and was put in touch with a befriender who had lost her husband in a collision. From there, I joined the North West Support Group, before joining the Siblings Support Group in May 2024. The Siblings Group became my safe place, where the members understood what I was going through, and every emotion I had was valid. They aren’t the family I sought to have, but I’m honoured to walk down this path alongside them.
In October 2025, I went to the Houses of Parliament along with some other RoadPeace members for the launch of a new guide to help MPs better support constituents who had been bereaved or seriously injured as a result of road collisions. Hearing the stories of other members who had lost loved ones was so harrowing.
I want the law to be changed so that any person who causes death by dangerous driving is never allowed to drive again. No exceptions. The loss of a loved one is permanent – why should the killer’s punishment be temporary?
A driving licence is a privilege, not a right, and with that privilege comes responsibility. A car is like a knife, very useful, but potentially fatal when handled irresponsibly.
I also want every new driver, at the point they pass their practical test, to be required to e-sign a Drivers’ Pledge. This would be a legally binding contract stating that the new driver would always drive according to the relevant traffic laws, not drive impaired, ensure that the vehicle was roadworthy and insured etc. This agreement would be logged with DVSA against a new driver’s full licence number, and would serve as proof of a lifelong commitment to keeping themselves and other road users safe.
Updated on: 12 November 2025