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A BRITISH MAN who killed his date in a speedboat crash and went on the run ahead of his trial has given himself up in the ex-Soviet republic of Georgia, police said today.
Jack Shepherd, 31, was convicted of manslaughter last year for the death of Charlotte Brown, a 24-year-old woman he took on a champagne-fuelled first date on his speedboat in the River Thames in 2015.
The boat flipped over after Shepherd handed Brown the controls and she was recovered unconscious.
Shepherd was rescued after being found clinging to the upturned hull.
“I confirm that Jack Shepherd handed himself to Georgian police today,” interior ministry spokeswoman Sopho Mdinaradze told AFP.
Shepherd “will be detained and afterwards legal procedures will be launched into his extradition to the UK,” she said.
He is being held in a police station in Georgia’s capital Tbilisi and is accompanied by his lawyers, she added.
British police said in a statement that they had received information from the National Crime Agency (NCA) that Shepherd is in police custody in Georgia.
“His identity has yet to be officially confirmed,” London’s Metropolitan Police said. “However, if the man is confirmed as Shepherd, extradition proceedings will begin immediately.”
Shepherd, a web designer, vanished before his trial last summer and was convicted of manslaughter by gross negligence and sentenced to six years in prison in his absence.
An international warrant was issued for his arrest.
Georgia’s Rustavi-2 television showed footage of a man it identified as Shepherd entering a police station and aired an exclusive interview with him on this evening.
The station said he had arrived from Istanbul last March and since lived in Tbilisi.
‘Confident of innocence’
In the interview, in which his voice was dubbed over in Georgian, Shepherd said he been involved in a “tragic” accident and had gone into hiding to avoid going to prison.
“I hope that the truth will be established, that my appeal will be granted and that everyone can move forward with their lives,” he said
His Georgian lawyer Tariel Kupatadze told Rustavi-2 that his client was “confident that he will be able to prove his innocence and will be acquitted”.
“His goal is to cooperate with the investigation and the judiciary and to provide the court with all the information into the case,” the lawyer said.
The victim’s father, Graham Brown, wrote on Facebook: “Just been informed that Jack Shepherd has been arrested in Georgia. Justice for Charlotte is close!”
The case has attracted intense interest in British media, with theories about where he could be, ranging from Thailand to Turkey.
Brown’s family met British Home Secretary Sajid Javid on Tuesday to ask him to track down Shepherd.
“Charlotte’s family are understandably heartbroken and distraught following this awful tragedy. I have taken a personal interest in this case and am determined to ensure Jack Shepherd faces justice,” Javid said earlier.
“I told the family we will strain every sinew and explore every option to bring them the justice they deserve as soon as possible,” he said.
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Great relief for her family. This guy failed to show for his trial and then asked for legal aid to appeal whilst on the run. Classy
But she crashed the boat?
@Winston Smith: but she was a minor… oh no wait she wasn’t
@Winston Smith: I thought the same. If he’d died, wonder what would have happened. It’s tragic but she caused the crash
@Winston Smith: his boat wasn’t sea-worthy, he was already speeding when he handed over control (30 knots, 12 is the limit on the Themes), he was drunk (so was she) and he handed the controls to someone who hadn’t a clue how to control the vehicle, and so they convicted him of manslaughter by gross negligence (11-1)
@Karen Wellington: If all those things happened in a car would he have been charged with manslaughter? I doubt it. Had she been behind the wheel of a car, he probably would not have been charged at all.
@James Wallace: I think if you let someone who has never driven a car before behind the wheel of your car they’d hold you at least partly responsible for any damage or carnage caused (I mean in the UK, they definitely would here).
@Karen Wellington: you can kill people here in a motor vehicle through gross negligence and get a 12 month suspended sentence because the judge feels sorry for you. It happened here only last week, not for the first time.
@James Wallace: ok, but what do our crappy sentencing guidelines have to do with whether or not he was convicted?
He might have gotten a lighter sentence too if he’d shown some remorse, or shown up.
@Karen Wellington: I’m just pointing out the double standards involved.
@James Wallace: can you elaborate on what double standard? Boats vs cars? British justice system vs Irish justice system?
@Karen Wellington: There’s a saying,’ if you want to kill someone do it with a car, its likely all you will get is a slap on the wrist’ homicide by car is just not taken seriously enough. In the UK a cyclist killed a pedestrian & the cops threw the book at him. This guy, the cops threw the book at him, rightly so. but the same standards are not applied to drivers who kill through gross negligence. even when they are charged and convicted, they mostly get a slap on the wrist.. Just before christmas, a Dublin bus driver was convicted for killing a woman, after he came around a corner on the wrong side. He’d pleaded not guilty & his defence team tried to victim blame, but still he got no jail time & judge deferred the driving ban on him until after xmas, so he could return to work!
@James Wallace: firstly, I don’t think that’s a real saying, I think you made it up to support your point (unnecessarily). I agree with you, sentencing in this country is a fcuking insult to victims and the general population, I’m not sure how bringing Britain down to our level would help though.
@Karen Wellington: vessel, not vehicle.
@Karen Wellington: no, I didn’t make it up I’m afraid. I’m not saying they should be brought to our level, my point is motorists regularly get away with things that, in other cases not involving road vehicles, go to jail for.
@James Wallace: You dont know what sentence he would have got so you cant compare.
Why would you get into a speedboat with anybody if your both way over the limit. He’s a fool but she really should have refused to go along
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