THE CORONER for West Galway, Dr Ciarán McLoughlin, said it was a breakthrough in crash investigations to be able to state where exactly a person was standing before they were knocked down.
He made his remarks during an inquest into the death of David Solomon (53) at Glebe, Oughterard, Co Galway at about 2am on July 29th, 2007. He died from injuries he sustained when he was struck by a car as he walked home.
The accident was one of the first cases to be investigated by the Garda Ombudsman, as the driver was an off-duty garda John Kavanagh.
Garda Anthony Kelly of the forensic investigation unit at Dublin Castle said he investigated the death of Mr Solomon.
The inquest in Galway heard that Mr Solomon had visited three pubs in Oughterard with friends some hours earlier and had five pints before getting some takeaway food and setting out to walk home.
He was dressed almost entirely in black and walking along the Moycullen Road when gardaí in a passing Garda car became concerned for his safety as he was walking on the hard shoulder. They turned the car around, but almost immediately came upon the scene of an incident.
Witnesses told of Garda Kavanagh’s distress at the scene as he had been travelling home with his son at the time of the incident.
Garda Kelly said that the condition of his car was not a contributory factor to the incident. He had been driving between 68 and 90km/h in a 100km/h zone and Mr Solomon had been dressed in a black fleece with black trousers.
Garda Kelly had succeeded in identifying Mr Solomon’s position when struck by the car due to a shoe scuff mark on the road and using new equipment. In reply to Dr McLoughlin, he said that his position would have been “as good as the middle of the road”.
A breath-test conducted on Garda Kavanagh returned a zero reading. Mr Solomon’s blood alcohol reading was 147mg. Following an investigation by the Garda Ombudsman Commission’s Office, the Director of Public Prosecutions decided that there should not be a prosecution.
The jury returned a verdict in accordance with the medical evidence, stating that Mr Solomon had died of multiple injuries arising from the incident.