A DRIVER, who left a man with mulptiple injuries in a horrific road smash, believes it was right for him to serve just a third of his prison sentence.

“There was no point keeping me there,” he told the Oxford Mail.

Michael Parslow – freed three months into a 10-month sentence – said he can be of more use to society outside of prison.

The 39-year-old drove onto the wrong side of Bernwood Road in Bicester while overtaking three vehicles in his sports car and struck motorcyclist Gareth Jenkins head on.

The force of the November 23 collision sent the 23-year-old motorcylist 80 metres down the road, leaving him with multiple injuries.

Mr Parslow, driving a Toyota MR2, was jailed for 10 months for dangerous driving, banned for three years and told to take an extended driving test at Oxford Crown Court in May.

Under the 2003 Criminal Justice Act, prisoners are freed after half their sentences.

He said within two weeks in prison he was told he was eligible for a curfew monitored by an electronic tag. He was released on licence on August 4 and returned to his Bicester home.

He said: “It’s my first time in prison and because the probation report said I had skills and could be useful to society, there’s no point keeping me there.

“The fact that I can be back working before my sentence ends has got to be a positive thing.

“Society gets the benefit of me paying my taxes, rather than paying for me to be in prison.”

The former IT worker has nine drugs convictions from 1994 to 2003 and was given an absolute discharge for driving while disqualified in 2002.

While in prison he completed a business enterprise course in prison and now wants to start a company.

He said: “I made the most of what I could. I’ve come out of it fairly positively, it could have been a lot worse. Luckily enough I haven’t got too used to the prison atmosphere and being out I’m back to square one – where I was when I went in.”

Judge Patrick Eccles was told Mr Jenkins suffered broken neck and back vertebrates, a ruptured kidney, broken wrists and a fractured shoulder.

Mr Parslow told the Oxford Mail he was “horrified” by what happened to Mr Jenkins.

He had made a “substantial recovery” but could not play contact sport, the judge was told.

The Oxford Mail was unable to contact Mr Jenkins for comment.

The family of Rose Hill dad-of-six David Cox, who was killed after a single punch to the head, hit out at early releases.

They are awaiting the early release of killer Jonathan Newton, then 18 and of Spencer Crescent, who was given a 36-month sentence last February for the June 2010 manslaughter of Mr Cox.

Valerie Marsden, Mr Cox’s sister, said: “At least he would be getting his punishment if he served the whole sentence – we’ve got a lifetime of punishment.

“I don’t think justice was done.”

Jean Taylor, of action group Families Fighting for Justice, whose son Stephen was killed in 2000 and whose daughter Chantel was murdered in 2004, said: “It makes you sad to think this is all your loved ones are worth.

“As a mother you don’t want to hear how your child’s killer is getting on, or being allowed out, you just want to know he’s still inside locked in a cell.”

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