Grieving mum had no key for fall window

THE grieving mother of a one-year-old baby boy who sustained fatal head injuries when he fell from a second-floor apartment window has told an inquest they did not have a key to lock the window.

Oskars Daukste of Lydon Court, Bothar Irwin, Galway, was just one year and four months when he fell 30 feet from a bedroom window of a rented apartment off Eyre Square on the morning of March 27, 2010.

Dublin City Coroner’s Court heard the baby’s mother Agita Daukste was tired as Baby Oskars had not gone to sleep until late the previous night and she fell asleep while her son was playing on the bedroom floor.

She woke a short time later to the sound of banging at her door and found that Oskars wasn’t in the bedroom and that the window, which had been closed before she fell asleep, was now open.

“I ran to the front door. I was told by two men that a baby had fallen out of the window and onto the footpath below. I knew it was Oskars. I ran down straight away. He was badly injured,” said Ms Daukste who is from Latvia.

“I don’t know how I fell asleep. I didn’t mean to go asleep,” she said.

Passer-by Seamus Friel said he had crossed the road and stepped onto the footpath when, “something fell from the sky” about six to 10 feet in front of him.

“I didn’t know what it was initially, but when I went over I realised it was a young child,” said Mr Friel, who checked the

Ms Daukste told the coroner Dr Brian Farrell she always made sure the window was closed but that there was no key to lock the window and so it was easy to open.

The bed was against the wall by the window and Oskars tried to look out the window when he was standing on the bed, she said.

She had hung balloons to the left of the window to distract him from the window.

Ms Daukste’s boyfriend, Ashish Kumar, who is from India and who also lived in the apartment, said they were not provided with a key and they did not ask for one.

Speaking from the body of the court he said they are looking at houses at the moment and in many of them there are no keys.

The coroner recorded a verdict of accidental death.

He said that in the public interest he was going to write to the national landlords’ representative association in Ireland, to the Irish Property Owners Association and to the apartment owner drawing their attention to what was said at the inquest in relation to the key, and in general in relation to the importance of providing a locking facility in apartments and other dwellings, particularly when the tenants are the parents of young children.

“We have had several inquests where similar incidents have occurred where children have fallen from windows of apartments and other properties where the window wasn’t secured properly,” said the coroner.

Investigating officer Sheena Gill of Galway Garda Station, was unable to comment on the matter of the key.

There were no suspicious circumstances.

The baby was taken by ambulance to University College Hospital Galway where he was stabilised before being transferred to Temple Street Children’s Hospital, Dublin, later that day.

He died from severe head injuries at the Dublin Hospital on March 29.

The coroner expressed his condolences to Ms Daukste and to her boyfriend.

“It is a very tragic accident,” he said.

Speaking outside the court after the inquest Ms Daukste and Mr Kumar said they should have had a key for the window.

Ms Daukste said her baby son was “happy and full of energy”.

She said his death was a huge loss.