Owen Maughan, 27, who was driving one of the vehicles, had previously pleaded guilty to the manslaughter of Peter Maughan, who died in the crash near Dartford on 1 June.
He was on trial for murder, alongside his 54-year-old father, Patrick Maughan, who was the front seat passenger in his truck.
A jury at Maidstone Crown Court found them both not guilty of murder on Wednesday. Patrick was found guilty of manslaughter.Peter was in the back of his vehicle with his one-year-old sister, while their mother Hayley – Owen’s cousin – and her partner, Lovell Mahon, were driving on the A2 near Dartford.
Owen and his father chased their pick-up truck for several miles in a state of “fury” and “rammed” it off the road, the court heard earlier.
Prosecutor Richard Jory KC told jurors the reason why the pair were angry was unclear, though they had been drinking during the day in Rochester.
Peter was thrown from the vehicle and died. His mother found him lying face down in grass and screamed for help.
‘Car a weapon’
Mahon was seriously injured in the crash on New Barn Lane, and is unlikely to walk again.
Owen previously told jurors he “made a cowardly decision” to flee the scene after seeing his relative’s car roll several times.
He and Patrick had had about 12 bottles of beer and 13 pints respectively before getting in the car, the court heard.
Jory called the action “a deliberate ramming at high speed” and added Owen had “used his car as a weapon”.After he and Mahon argued back and forth while driving along the road, Owen went into the wrong lane and clipped the back of their car at about 60 mph (97km/h), the court heard.
“I thought I would just put a dent on the side of his car and he would stop,” the 27-year-old had told the court.
Peter’s mother, Hayley, said in a police interview they were in fear of their lives during the chase.
“We begged them,” she said. “We told them that the children were in the motor.”
On hearing of Peter’s death, Owen told jurors he knew he had to “go back and face the consequences”.
He handed himself in to a police station with his mother the next morning.
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