A drunken Co Fermanagh man was jailed for four years yesterday for causing the death of a baby boy by careless driving.
Two-year-old Joshua Wilson died from multiple injuries on December 18th, 1999, after a car driven by James Gilroy crashed head-on into his mother's vehicle.
Gilroy (25), from Aughamore, Boho, near Enniskillen, had pleaded guilty at Craigavon Crown Court, sitting in Belfast, to causing death by careless driving by reason of excess alcohol and to two charges of causing grievous bodily harm.
Mr Justice Kerr heard Gilroy had an alcohol level of just over twice the legal limit.
The accident occurred at about 8 p.m. after Mrs Dorothy Wilson had parked on the right hand side of Drumree Road outside the family's newly-built bungalow in Derrygonnelly. She had put on the hazard lights when Gilroy's car struck her, spinning her vehicle round 180 degrees into another parked car.
Mrs Wilson suffered numerous lacerations to the face and legs and required dental surgery. Kirsty Wilson (10) sustained fractures to the skull and frontal sinuses.
Prosecuting QC Mr John Orr told the court the pleas to the reduced charge of careless driving had been accepted because the highway code indicated that a vehicle should be parked on its own side of the road at night time.
Passing sentence the judge said it was clear Gilroy was travelling too fast for the conditions which prevailed and that, whether through inattention or the effects of drink, he was not keeping a proper look-out.
The accident point was visible from at least 160 metres but the tyre marks began only some 100 feet from the point of impact.
The judge said Gilroy must have been aware that he was unfit to drive.
"His decision to drive after having consumed the amount of alcohol he had had was scandalously irresponsible.
"The untold misery caused by drink-driving could not find a more telling illustration than is provided by this case.
"An innocent child, an only son in a family of four, has had his young life extinguished in the most horrific of circumstances", the judge continued.
"One can only glimpse at the pain his family has had to endure since that fateful night; at the horror of his parents - his mother trapped in the car beside Joshua when he suffered these grievous injuries, and his distraught father picking up and running with the body of his son, the life draining from it, in a desperate attempt to get help."
But the judge said he also took account of the devastating effect the accident had on the accused man and his family.
Gilroy was now the father of a baby, he had been gravely injured and his working capacity had been seriously compromised.
"Also in his favour, I consider that he pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity."
For this reason the sentence imposed was significantly less severe than if he had been convicted after a trial.
Gilroy was also directed to spend 12 months on probation after his release from prison, and banned from driving for eight years.