THE driver of the car which crashed killing Max Lewis broke down in tears in the witness box as he gave evidence at his trial.

Dan Palmer sobbed 'I wish I were dead' as he told a jury about the smash on a country lane between Lacock and Melksham.

Palmer, 23, said 19-year-old Max was his best friend who he saw almost every day after they became close about four years earlier.

And he said that a day doesn't go by when he relives the horror of what happened on the afternoon of Saturday, November 15, last year.

But he also told a jury at Swindon Crown Court he was only partly to blame for the crash saying the driver of a horse transporter was also responsible.

Had it not been over on his side of the road, something the driver of it denies, he said he would not have had to take evasive action.

Giving evidence at his trial he said: "I am taking half responsibility. If I was going 5mph slower, as I said, I could have stopped rather than going up on the verge."

Charles Gabb, prosecuting, put to him that the woman driving the other vehicle was tucked in close to the edge as she rounded the bend, as she knew it was a dangerous corner.

But the defendant insisted she was blocking in the region of a third of his side of the road and he was faced with a head on collision or mounting the verge.

He said he was wrong when he told the police he had braked before leaving the road and said he could remember little after his car came back off the grass.

Palmer also denied he was trying to catch up friend Connor Forester, who he agreed should not have been driving, after he had been with him at a car park in Lacock.

When he told police he said to Forrester 'I'll catch you up, I'll meet you back at Melksham', he said he meant he would see him later and he was in no rush.

Palmer also agreed that as 19-year-old Forrester did not have a licence or insurance and had never had a lesson in his life he ought not have been on the road.

And he said that when they had been hanging out in a Lacock car park Forrester and a pal were rolling up cannabis joints.

They offered him one which he refused as he was racing quad bikes the next day and needed a clear head.

He said he did not know if they smoked them, despite being parked next to their car with the windows open.

But he admitted he had some of the drug the night before, though he said it had no effect on his driving the next day, and had a caution and conviction for possession.

Prosecutors say Palmer and Forester were racing along the road with 26-year-old Julian Drew at the head of a convoy of three cars. Both other defendants declined to give evidence.

Drew, of Littlejohn Avenue, Forester, of Meadow Road, Melksham, and Palmer, of Bowmans Court, Melksham, deny causing death by dangerous driving.

Drew and Forester also deny alternative counts of dangerous driving. Palmer admits causing death by careless driving.

The case continues.