Jail for drink driver who killed mate

Wally David Watson sentenced in the Auckland High Court today for the manslaughter of his friend,Gavin Cuthbert. Photo / Dean Purcell.

A disqualified drunken driver who crashed his friend's ute and killed him has been sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in prison.

Wally David Watson gave the family of Gavin Cuthbert the finger as he left the High Court at Auckland to begin his prison sentence.

He had originally told police that his dead friend, 40-year-old Gavin Cuthbert, was behind the wheel.

But a jury accepted the Crown's case that Mr Cuthbert was a passenger.

It found Watson guilty of manslaughter, drink driving and driving while disqualified at his trial in August.

Watson maintains his innocence. As the court registrar formally asked him if he had anything to say, Watson stood and said: "Yeah, you've got the wrong guy".

Justice Patrick Keane told Watson that he had posed a danger to other motorists when he chose to drive with twice the legal limit of alcohol in his system.

"Very shortly after the car was upended two more motorists arrived. Had they been only slightly earlier, the result could have been more extreme."

The court heard evidence that both men had been drinking at a party before getting into Mr Cuthbert's orange Chevrolet ute in the early hours of February 15 last year.

The ute was travelling at between 90 and 100km/h in a 50km/h zone in the Auckland suburb of Glen Eden when it crashed into a retaining wall.

The ute flipped and Mr Cuthbert was flung from the vehicle and was pinned underneath.

He died at the scene from severe head injuries. Watson was able to get himself free from the wreck.

No one saw the crash but a Crown digital reconstruction and a police investigation found it was likely Watson was behind the wheel.

-APNZ