A 71-year-old part-time undertaker was today jailed for two years and banned from driving for 10 years after he pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing the death of a teenager on the main Cork-Dublin Road over two years ago.
Senan Waters of Dublin Road, Fermoy had pleaded guilty last October at Cork Circuit Criminal Court to dangerous driving causing the death of 19-year-old Sian Roberts on the N8 at Dunkettle, Glanmire, on January 21st 2008.
Sgt Bill Daly of Glanmire Garda station told the court how Ms Roberts was driving in her Ford Ka to her home in Fermoy from Cork city where she was working as a trainee hairdresser when she pulled in on the hard shoulder and put on her hazard lights.
Waters was travelling in the same direction and had a good sight distance to Ms Roberts's car and although it was dark, should have seen the vehicle but failed to do so and crashed into the Ford Ka, causing it to go further into the hard shoulder where it hit a crash barrier.
The Ford Ka then spun around some 180 degrees and shot back out into the main carriageway of the roadway where it ended up facing south in the wrong direction where it was hit by another car resulting in fatal injuries to Ms Roberts who was pronounced dead at the scene.
Gardai were satisfied that Waters's driving and failure to see Ms Roberts's car was the cause of the accident and while he told gardai that his car had been hit in the rear by another car, gardai examined his rear fender of his Nissan Almeira but could find no evidence to support this contention, said Sgt Daly.
Sgt Daly agreed with defence counsel, Tom Creed SC that there were no aggravating factors such as drink or speed but simply that Waters failed to properly utilise the sight distance available to him to avoid Ms Roberts's car.
Ms Roberts' family submitted a victim impact statement which wasn't read out in court but defence counsel, Tom Creed sought to address the issue of the timing of his guilty plea which came some 10 months after he was first charged.
"I understand that they were under terrible strain while awaiting finality," said Mr Creed, adding that his client had been awaiting the completion of an engineer's report and that only became available in October 2009 and he then entered a plea of guilty.
Mr Creed said that his client had refrained from contacting the family to express remorse and sorrow because he didn't wish to aggravate a sensitive situation but he was now expressing his remorse and condolences of his client's behalf.
Judge Con Murphy accepted that drink and speed were not factors in the case and Waters had no previous convictions but taking all factors into account, he said he felt he had no option but to jail Waters and he sentenced him to two years and banned him from driving for 10 years.
Speaking afterwards, Ms Robert's parents, Jeff and Michelle said they were pleased the court case had clarified that their daughter had done nothing wrong in her driving but said that nothing would bring their daughter back and they were still hurting hugely from her death.
