(Top) Antonio Boparan Singh (right) leaves court with his father; Cerys Edwards

London, April 3: The son of a wealthy Indian businessman is facing up to two years in jail for recklessly driving his family’s Land Rover at 72mph in a 30mph zone and inflicting brain damage on a 11-month-old girl.

While Antonio Boparan Singh, 21, will be sentenced at the Birmingham Crown Court on April 24, his victim, Cerys Edwards, now aged two, continues to require 24-hour care and cannot breathe without a ventilator, her parents said.

A jury has found Boparan, a resident of an affluent part of Sutton Coldfield in the West Midlands, guilty of dangerous driving.

Boparan, who was 19 when the accident occurred in November 2006, was weaving in and out of traffic at high speed in his mother’s £57,000 Range Rover, which was equipped with high-tech German airbags. He lost control while overtaking.

Ironically for Boparan, it was the safety device intended to cushion drivers in the event of an impact that allowed investigators to calculate the precise speed at which he hit the Jeep carrying Cerys. The “event data recorder” was used to establish that a force equivalent to 42mph was lost in one fifth of a second in the crash.

The case is believed to be the first in the UK to use such a system as evidence in a prosecution.

Simon Davis, for the prosecution, described the device as the automotive equivalent of a black box flight recorder, which is analysed after air crashes. The device, fitted to the air-bag system, continuously records the car’s performance on a loop and is mainly used by engineers to diagnose problems. In a crash, it freezes and stores the speed and braking information at the point of impact.

Although Boparan lied to paramedics and claimed the baby was in her father’s lap — this might have reduced his liability for the extent of the injuries she suffered — Cerys was, in fact, secured in a child seat at the back. The collision shunted the Jeep 57ft backwards and into the car behind, snapping Cerys neck and causing brain damage.

Her father Gavin Edwards, a 43-year-old builder, suffered a broken nose and rib in the crash. “I was investigated for a week by the police, until they realised it was all complete lies,” he said.

Boparan’s parents — Ranjit and Baljinder Boparan Singh — have a business, 2 Sisters Food Group, which supplies poultry to Tesco and other outlets. This is estimated to be worth £130 million, placing the family at number 49 in the Sunday Times Rich List in Britain last year. The Range Rover was owned by Boparan Holdings that controls the 2 Sisters Food Group.