A boy racer caused the death of his best friend and work colleague after losing control of his car on a country road.

Ryan Naylor, 21, was driving his Citroen Saxo “recklessly and dangerously” in wet and dark conditions before it crashed head-on with a BMW in Ardley last October.

His front-seat passenger, Neil Webb, 19, of Spruce Drive, Bicester, suffered fatal injuries and was pronounced dead at the scene.

On Tuesday Naylor, of Ardley Road, Fewcott, was jailed for 32 months at Oxford Crown Court after admitting causing death by dangerous driving.

The two men had worked together at car-part firm First Line, in Bicester.

They were driving from a party in Bicester on October 15 when Naylor tailgated and overtook a car on Bucknell Road before misjudging a corner and spinning into the oncoming car.

Mr Webb’s girlfriend, Paige Deadman, 20, told the court she was left “scared” after travelling in Naylor’s car a few weeks before the crash.

She said: “He was a dangerous driver and I did not want to get back in the car.

“He would travel too fast and I was scared. But my boyfriend said I would be fine, and I trusted him.

“I never felt comfortable about his driving though.”

Mr Webb’s friend, David Behan, said he saw Naylor snort a line of cocaine on the night of the crash, although toxicology reports later showed no traces of the drug in his blood.

Mr Behan said: “He drank a can of Kronenbourg and snorted the drug off a windowsill.

“I heard him talking about how he had bought an eighth of cocaine and was going to sell enough to make some profit for himself.

“I had been in the car with Ryan a few times and he always drove recklessly and broke the speed limit.

“One time I asked to get out of the car and I never took a lift with him again.”

Judge Mary Mowat said she acknowledged the crash had left him depressed and said a recent suicide attempt was “genuine”.

But she added: “This was several minutes of deliberate risk taking, bravado and danger.

“This driving was not just a one-off. It was dark, wet and quite clearly you drove too fast for the circumstances.

“Neil Webb was a friend and you will have to live your life with the knowledge you caused his death.”

Naylor will serve half his sentence before being released on licence. He was also banned from driving for three years and ordered to take an extended driving test.