Inquest returns verdict of accidental death on 14-year-old driver in Kerry

State Pathologist, Dr Margot Bolster, said the cause of death of Thomas Healy was due to injuries in a road traffic accident

The inquest heard Thomas Healy had panicked after a garda van with its blue lights flashing had pursued them down Ross Road.

The inquest into the death five years ago of the 14-year-old driver of a car being pursued by a garda van on Ross Road in Killarney has returned a verdict of accidental death.

Contradictory evidence was heard in the inquest into Thomas Healy of the Gap of Dunloe. His best friend Alfie Barrett, aged 15 at the time, who was severely injured, said Thomas Healy had panicked after a garda van with its blue lights flashing had pursued them down Ross Road.

The last thing Mr Barrett recalled was the garda van coming right up behind them, its lights shining into the car and Thomas panicking. They had been trying to calm each other down. 

“He was a bit panicked.. He was nervous and shaking,” he told Dan O’Connor, solicitor for the Healy family.

Garda Sean O’Sullivan said he had lost sight of the car as it rounded a bend and sped down Ross Road away from him. He had expected to come across the car parked and abandoned; instead he found it crashed against a tree.

Alfie Barrett was “mistaken” in thinking the garda vehicle was right behind them at the time of the crash, Garda O’Sullivan replied to the family’s solicitor.

Garda Ombudsman Fiosrú had cleared Garda O’Sullivan of any responsibility in 2022, it was confirmed. CCTV footage was shown to the jury.

The inquest heard how shortly before midnight on July 7, 2021, Thomas Healy collected his best friend Alfie Barrett and the pair drove to Killarney to the Tesco car park. 

The two had been texting each other. It was the summer holidays. The car was used only on the family farm in the Gap of Dunloe. They had not been wearing safety belts.

Garda O’Sullivan told how at around 1.05am he was approaching the Park Road roundabout and observed an old Toyota Corolla. The front-seat passenger was looking back regularly at the garda van and the digits on the registration plate appeared deliberately obscured.

There was no excessive speed, and there was no other car on the road. It went onto the East Avenue road and towards the Muckross Road. He activated the blue flashing light, and the Corolla took off at speed through the Muckross road roundabout.

He followed and thought it might have turned into one of the housing estates on the road. The speed was not excessive, but the garda van would be more slow-moving than the car, and the car was trying to get away, Mr O’Sullivan told the jury.

Evidence from Garda Public Service Vehicle and Scenes of Crime investigators heard how the car’s NCT had expired in 2018 and 6,751 miles had been added since the test.

The car was in good mechanical order — its brakes and steering were good — but its tyres were old. One was 15 years old. Other than the tyres, it was roadworthy.

“A mechanical defect did not cause the collision,” vehicle inspector Garda Thomas Brosnan said. Sergeant Mark O’Connor, forensic vehicle inspector, said the driver failed to negotiate the bend, mounted the footpath and collided with the large tree.

State Pathologist, Dr Margot Bolster, said the cause of death was due to injuries in a road traffic accident. After retiring, the jury of three women and three men brought in a unanimous verdict of accidental death.