Limp Bizkit manager: Promoters could have prevented fan's death

Limp Bizkit's tour manager told an inquest today that concert organisers are to blame for the death of a 15-year old fan.

Jessica Michalik was crushed during the band's show at the Big Day Out festival in Sydney, Australia last year.

Chris Gratton said the concert promoters had failed to control the "absolute crowd mayhem".

He rejected claims frontman Fred Durst aggravated and provoked the crowd by screaming obscenities at them.

"This is one of the scariest things I have ever seen. I have been doing this for over 12 years and I have never, ever seen something so frightful," Gratton said, after being shown video footage of the night.

He said Michalik's death could have been prevented if the promoters had stopped the show.

"It would have been a simple matter for the promoters to have killed the band's sound and to have taken immediate control of the sound and lighting systems in the arena," he said.

He said security staff "just stood back and did nothing" when a crowd of up to 50 people collapsed meters from the stage.

"They (security guards) did not appear to recognise the signs that people were distressed and needed to be removed," he said.

Durst is scheduled to give evidence via a video link from Los Angeles on June 17.

The inquest is investigating events leading up to Michalik's death. At the end of the inquiry, coroner Jacqueline Milledge can recommend charges be filed, but prosecutors do not have to act on the recommendations.