Boy, three, died after drinking weedkiller

A THREE-YEAR-OLD boy died after accidentally drinking weedkiller from a 7Up bottle in the garden of his grandfather’s home, an inquest heard yesterday.

Seamus Hade Snr, the grandfather of James, broke down as he explained how the lethal liquid came to be in the back garden of his home at Oakley Park in Carlow.

The little boy’s father, Seamus Hade Jnr, told the Dublin City Coroner’s Court he had been minding his four children during the weekends at his parents’ home since he had split with his wife Catherine.

On May 16, 2004, he said he was feeding one of his children in the sitting room when he heard his daughter Rebecca tell his mother that James had drunk something in the back garden.

“My mother was on the phone to my father panicking. She was very upset,” he said. “My mother kept wiping his mouth.”

After Mr Hade Snr rushed back to the house, they brought James to the District Hospital in Carlow.

Mr Hade Snr told the inquest he kept paint and thinner materials in a wheelie bin in the back garden of his home, and he had removed some items that morning to carry out some tiling work for one of his other sons.

“But I can’t honestly recall taking out the bottle of weed killer,” he said.

The inquest heard James had begun to vomit after drinking liquid from a container in the back garden of the house, which was described as a 7Up bottle containing weedkiller.

“In 2003, I poured the remainder of the liquid in the can [of weedkiller] into a 7Up bottle and put a sports type bottle cap on top of it,” Mr Hade Snr said.