Insane driver who killed two committed for treatment

A man whose dangerous driving killed two people has escaped manslaughter charges by reason of insanity, after telling police he was in a time machine and could become invisible above 100km/h.

Mark Paul Warren was the unlicensed driver of a Toyota Altezza that collided with a Toyota Rav4 on George Bolt Drive, Mangere, in December 2007.

The crash killed Warren's passenger and a passenger in the Rav4.

Warren, a 26-year-old sickness beneficiary, later said he genuinely believed he could pass through walls and matter if travelling beyond that speed.

This week in the High Court at Auckland, Justice Geoffrey Venning committed Warren to Hamilton's Henry Rongomau Bennett Centre, a facility for people with acute mental illness. The treatment order can be reviewed in six months.

Justice Venning had found Warren not guilty of two counts of manslaughter and driving in a dangerous manner causing injury after two independent psychiatric reports and an uncontested insanity hearing in April. The court heard that Warren suffered from bipolar affective disorder, commonly known as manic depression.

But the mother of Warren's passenger is understood to be furious at the court ruling. Her son Stephen Ashley Curry - who was 21 at the time - sent text messages to a friend while in the car with Warren asking her to contact police about his dangerous driving. She did so and a patrol car was dispatched, but not in time. A speed analysis found Warren was travelling at up to 166km/h when he crashed.

Warren was speeding and swerving between lanes on George Bolt Drive when he struck the outside kerb on a right-hand bend, then veered across two lanes and struck the median strip.

The car flew into the air and landed in front of the oncoming Rav4, in which Ji Young Baek and her mother, Young Soon Hwang, were travelling.

Mr Curry and Ms Hwang died at the scene. Ms Baek spent two months in hospital.