Truck driver sentenced for four-year-old's death

The father of a four-year-old girl killed after the car she was travelling in was struck by a truck has described how he contemplated suicide in a desperate bid to "hold his little girl again".

Anthony O'Rourke was speaking at the sentencing hearing tonight, of a Dublin truck driver who was convicted last month of dangerous driving causing the death of Jade O'Reilly from Skerries in Co Dublin, almost three years ago.

Vincent Ryan, (aged 56), Dunemer Drive, Lusk, Co Dublin, and formerly of Rivervalley, Swords, had denied a charge dangerous driving causing the death of the four-year-old twin on July 22 2002, at Adare in Co Limerick.

Mr Ryan received a five-year suspended jail sentence and was disqualified from driving for 12 years by Judge Carroll Moran at Limerick Circuit Court.

Speaking after the sentence was imposed Jade's father Anthony O'Rourke said he was relieved that "it was finally over" and that someone had been held resonsible for his daughter's death.

Mr O'Reilly said he was disapointed that the punishment wasn't a custodial one, but admitted that he had not been expecting a prison sentence.

During the hearing Jade's father, spoke of the heartache he and his fiancee Nina O'Reilly have been enduring since the death of their daughter who was a twin sister of Erin.

"We've received counselling on an ongoing basis, had to take anti-depressants and sleeping tablets. Suicide had become a daily thought just so we could hold her again," he told the court.

During the moving victim impact report Mr O'Rourke described how Jade's twin sister Erin had a bond with her sister that only twins will ever understand.

He said the couple's youngest child Dylan, one, will never know his sister and his only knowledge of her will be from photographs.

The visibly distraught father told the court about the day his fiancee rang him to say there had been an accident and that Jade had been hurt.

The four-year-old child and her twin sister Erin were returning home from a holiday with their grandparents and extended family in Co Kerry when the fatal accident occurred outside the Co Limerick village of Adare.

The twins were travelling in a convoy of three cars when their vehicle which was being driven by their grandmother was struck from behind by a truck.

Counsel for Vincent Ryan - the truck driver, who denied the charge of dangerous driving - told the court tonight that his client, who had no previous convictions prior to this incident, was not speeding or had not been drinking.

John O'Sullivan (BL) said his client who is a married father of four had only contested the charge on the grounds that he did not believe he had been driving dangerously.

Mr O'Sullivan read a letter from Mr Ryan's doctor and counsellor who wrote that he had been extremely depressed after the accident and had been unable to eat or sleep.

Mr O'Sullivan said his client was very remorseful about what had happened and had to live with the consequences of what happened every day.

Judge Carroll Moran described the case as "tragic and hearwrenching" and offered his condolensces to Jade's family.