A warehouse worker was killed when he drove a stolen car at high speed and crashed into a tree, an inquest in Oxford heard.

Henry Nelson, 24, who lived in a caravan at Station Approach, Banbury, died instantly when the Audi veered off the A4074 at Cane End, near Henley, at a spot nicknamed the 13 Bends of Death on Sunday, August 15, last year.

His girlfriend Emma Hullet and her daughters Jade, two, and Kate, one, were trapped in the wreckage.

The car caught fire and Ms Hullet and the two girls were pulled clear by motorists who stopped to help. All three were burned and suffered bone fractures. A pathologist's report concluded that Mr Nelson died of multiple injuries before the fire started.

In a statement, Ms Hullet said that she and her boyfriend took the car from Banbury railway station car park and set out for Reading with her two daughters in the front seat with her.

She said: "I now know that we were involved in an accident.

"I remember driving along. The next thing I remember was looking up and I was in Stoke Mandeville Hospital. I have no idea what caused the crash."

During the journey, she and the children moved into the rear seat while the car was moving. None of them was wearing a seatbelt. A pathologist's report said Mr Nelson's badly burned body could not provide usable samples for drug testing, although low levels of methadone were found in his remains. Syringes, suspected of containing drugs, were found in the wreckage.

There were no witnesses to the crash but several motorists said the car had passed them at high speed. Motorist Dr Timothy Perera, of Stadhampton, said in a statement that the Audi driver was travelling at 60 to 70mph.

He said: "As we approached a right-hand bend with a double white line system, I heard a bang."

All three survivors were pulled from the wreckage.

Coroner Nicholas Gardiner recorded a verdict of accidental death.