Farmer on trial over his father’s death in tractor collision

A TYRONE farmer has gone on trial accused of causing the death by dangerous driving of his 69-year-old father.

The pensioner, Phelim Alexander Brady, suffered multiple injuries and died three years ago this Sunday when a cattle lorry crashed into the rear of the tractor and trailer driven by his son Paul.

Sitting in the dock of Dungannon Crown Court, sometimes with his head buried in his hands, Paul Brady listened as the prosecution claimed he was guilty because he allowed his father to travel on the draw bar between the tractor and trailer.

The 46-year-old, from Minterburn Road in Caledon, is also accused of causing his father’s death by driving while disqualified and without in- surance on the Woodlough A4 dual carriageway between Dungannon and Caledon.

In the dock beside him, also denying the death by dangerous driving charge, is 53-yearold lorry driver William Mark Murphy, from Prospect Road, Ballyward, Co Down.

As the trial was about to start, Murphy pleaded guilty to causing Mr Brady’s death by careless driving.

The plea was not accepted by the prosecution.

Opening his case, Peter Irvine QC told the jury what they would hear was a “particularly tragic case, a case where you will have a heart of stone if you were not to have a sympathetic disposal to the facts”.

The prosecution lawyer said that when interviewed Brady told police that he had not wanted to drive the tractor, but only agreed after his father, who rode on the draw bar, asked him to help take cattle to Dungannon market.

The court also heard that immediately after the accident he told police: “I told him he shouldn’t be on the draw bar.”

The lawyer said it would have been “obvious” to a careful and competent driver that this was “inherently dangerous”.

Turning to Murphy, the lawyer said he told police that he had been forced to abandon an overtaking manoeuvre by a speeding car overtaking him.

Mr Irvine claimed that Murphy had driven into the back of the trailer at “significant speed”. The lawyer said that this “amounts to dangerous driving”.

The trial, expected to last until next week, continues today.