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'I will hate you until my breath' vow to e-bike thug who killed grandmother
Reach Daily Express | May 15, 2026 11:40 PM CST

The devastated daughter of a grandmother mowed down and killed by a teenage E-bike yob told him she will "hate you until my last breath" as he was yesterday jailed for a high-speed hit and run smash. Gloria Stephenson's relatives have been left "incandescent with rage" after learning tearaway thug Billy Stokoe, whose modified machine could reach 60mph, will spend less than three and a half years in jail. There were gasps of shock as Judge Robert Adams told the 19-year-old killer he would spend just of his six years and nine months sentence behind bars for causing the death of Gloria Stephenson, 86, as she crossed a zebra crossing while taking her daily 10,000 steps along with her daughter's dog.

The decision enraged Mrs Stephenson's family who described it as "sickening and disgusting," insisting Stokoe had shown no remorse for his actions. Sickening video footage from the scene, played at Newcastle Crown Court, shows Stokoe collide with the pensioner and then fall from his bike.

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With a callous disregard for her plight, he first retrieved the bike and rode back to look down at Mrs Stephenson before speeding off to hide the machine at his friend's home.

Just 10 days after his arrest he asked police whether he could vary his bail conditions to allow him to watch Sunderland in last year's Championship play-off final at Wembley.

After the hearing, Julie Francis, the eldest daughter of retired Hospital Domestic Services Manager Mrs Stephenson, said: "It is absolutely disgusting and we are incandescent with rage.

"How can it possibly be justice when he will serve three years in prison for taking the life of our mother?"

On May 16th last year Stokoe's judgement was impaired by cannabis he had been smoking and he was unable to brake on the unroadworthy Sur-ron E-bike he had bought from a friend who advertised it for sale on Facebook.

The bike only had a working back brake, operated by the left brake lever which Stokoe could not use because he had his phone in his hand and was looking at it when he ploughed into the pensioner as she crossed Burdon Road, Sunderland, Tyne and Wear, in bright daylight at 1pm.

Mrs Stephenson, who suffered multiple broken bones and a torn heart wall, had gone out in her trainers, collecting her daughter Lisa Tench's dog as she went for her daily stroll.

In a harrowing victim statement, Mrs Tench told how she was called to the scene by a friend.

Addressing Stokoe, she said: "I will never be able to forget the image of my mother lying bruised and battered in the road, her right leg amputated below the knee, hanging onto her leg by a thread.

"She tried so hard to breathe. I begged her not to leave me. She tried with tears running down her cheeks but her body had suffered too much trauma and she could not fight the injuries you caused her.

"You have no moral compass. You are not a victim of your circumstances, you are a victim of your own behaviour. I will hate you until my last breath."

Judge Adams could have sentenced Stokoe to a maximum of 18 years but reduced the sentence because he had shown remorse and handed himself in to the police an hour and a quarter after the crash. The sentence was further reduced by a quarter for his guilty pleas.

Judge Adams added: "It is clear her family are suffering terribly and are very angry."

Stokoe has also been banned from driving for eight years and four months, at which point he will have to sit an extended driving test.

Helen Towers, for apprentice bricklayer Stokoe, said he suffered from ADHD, which he self-medicated by smoking cannabis.

Stokoe pleaded guilty in February to causing the death of Mrs Stephenson by dangerous driving while unlicenced and uninsured and under the influence of cannabis.


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