Brother tried to save crash victim

The mother of a Staffordshire teenager killed in a car crash near their home told today how his brother desperately tried to revive him at the scene.

Jason Waltho, aged 18, is believed to have died instantly in the accident, which happened just two miles from the family home in Milwich, near Stafford.

He was driving home along the B5027 with his 19-year-old brother Martin after dropping off Martin's girlfriend at her home in Uttoxeter. Jason's mother Susan Maitland, who runs Milwich Post Office at their home in Coton Hill, said he had only recently passed his driving test.

She said: "They skidded on a corner, hit the embankment and the car flipped over.

"Martin got out and our dog Arnie, who they'd taken with them, leapt out and ran off unhurt. But Jason wasn't moving, so Martin smashed the car window to get him out. He pulled him out and gave him CPR and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, but it seems he was already dead.

"He must have died in an instant. You can't believe it when you think that, just a few days before, he was sat at home with us opening his Christmas presents."

A friend, following in a car behind, raised the alarm after the crash, which happened just after midnight on Tuesday. Miss Maitland said: "Jason's father, Michael, went and expected to find the car stuck in a hedge. He went across to Jason, who was lying in the road, squeezed his hand and shouted in his ear to wake him but there was no response."

She said Jason, who also has a 16-year-old sister, Michaela, was in the sixth form at Thomas Alleyne's High School in Uttoxeter and used to be a member of Tean Rangers football club before the family moved to Milwich three years ago.

"He was very good at sport when he was younger. He was very bright and popular," she said. "In the last two or three years, he was constantly playing games or chatting with his friends on his computer. He wasn't sure what he wanted to do after school so he planned to take a year out working with his dad, who has an engineering firm."

Martin Waltho suffered a minor leg injury in the accident, which happened when Jason was driving the red Peugeot 206 on the B5027 Uttoxeter Road, near the village of Field, just after midnight.