A 16-year-old boy moped rider was hit by a car driven by a young woman who had minutes earlier been in a heated row with an ex-boyfriend who was a passenger.

The teenager, an accomplished sportsman, lay with multiple injuries in the road at Cemaes Bay, Anglesey, and  his horrified parents feared he would die, a judge heard.

No ambulance was available and a coastguard helicopter flew him to hospital with a broken jaw and nose, leg and chest injuries in October 2019.

The car driver, 25-year-old Leah Thomas of Maude Street, Rhyl, was spared a prison sentence after pleading guilty to dangerous driving which caused serious injury and being under the influence of cannabis.

Judge Nicola Jones explained at Caernarfon crown court the reason she wasn’t going straight to jail was because she was seven months pregnant, had a young daughter with severe medical problems who would be affected, and due to Covid restrictions in prison.

Instead Thomas received a 20-month sentence suspended for two years, with 30 rehabilitation sessions, an 8pm-6am curfew for six months, and a three year driving ban. The judge ordered that the injured boy should not be identified.

She said: “One can only imagine the horror he and his parents had gone through.”

Oliver King, prosecuting, said Thomas and her ex boyfriend had been involved in a heated argument when she picked him up from a pub. The crash happened on a gradual bend and Thomas’ explanation was that she had applied the handbrake because there was an animal in the road.

The car veered into the moped. A witness described the victim lying in the road in pain and the ex-boyfriend screaming and shouting. The the lad’s parents came to the scene after being called.

In an impact statement the boy’s father described him as caring and clean living, who didn’t drink and was anti-drugs. He was an accomplished sportsman with an ambition of becoming a professional, who had lost his apprenticeship job, having operations at Aintree Hospital.

Simon Killeen, defending, said Thomas was a hard working single mother and there was genuine remorse. He detailed problems she faced in caring for her child.

Judge Jones accepted there had been a momentary lapse of judgement but told Thomas, who wept in the dock, that taking cannabis “clearly impaired your judgement and driving.”