A drunk driver "callously" left his teenage friend to die in the road after a high-speed joyride ended in tragedy, a court heard.

Passenger Jamie White, 18, of Lomond Avenue, Brighton, was killed when he was flung from a stolen Ford Escort which had been driven the wrong way up a one-way street and smashed into a taxi before spinning into a pensioner and two other cars.

Pedestrian pensioner Donald Priest was also injured in the crash.

Driver Gary Whibley, 18, of Ditchling Road, ran from the scene and even pretended to be a German student before he was arrested, Hove Crown Court heard yesterday.

Whibley denied causing death by dangerous driving in Ditchling Road, Brighton, on November 26, last year.

Jahid Arien, 20, of Woodbourne Avenue, and 20-year-old Neil Clarke, of Rotherfield Crescent, both denied aggravated vehicle taking.

John Tanzier, prosecuting, told the jury that the four had spent that Friday night drinking in Brighton town centre with two other men.

Gary Whibley drove them in a white Ford Sierra, believed to belong to his mother, the court heard. They left the car at Preston Circus and went for several drinks at the King and Queen pub in Marlborough Place, then the Shark Bar and Swift's on West Street.

They all tried to get into Paradox nightclub but only two got in and the other four headed up Windsor Street where they broke into a blue Ford Escort.

The court heard how Whibley and the others, with White in the back seat, sped through red lights and the wrong way up a one-way street.

They were seen by a passing police van that noticed a door had been opened with a crowbar. The van turned round but was in no position to pursue them.

Mr Tanzier said: "It was being driven dangerously at speeds between 50 and 70mph in a 30mph zone."

At the junction of Upper Lewes Road and Viaduct Road at 1.30am it smashed into a taxi before spinning into two cars and hitting Donald Priest, in his seventies.

When the car came to rest, White had been thrown out of the rear windscreen, Clarke was lying injured in the road and Whibley and Arien made off, the court was told.

Mr Tanzier said: "He callously left the scene while his own friend was lying in the road dying... he wanted some German girls to pretend he was German and put his arm around one of their arms."

The jury heard Whibley also spoke to a man who witnessed the crash and told him to say he (Whibley) had been with him all night. He said, 'You say anything different and you're dead'."

Yesterday, Greg Robson, 20, and Justin Wingrove, 19, gave evidence that they had stayed in the Paradox when the others were left outside.

The case continues today.