Learner driver’s car ‘shot across road’ in crash that killed four
‘She kept screaming’ Collision happened ‘very fast’
Dayna Kearney, 23, a learner driver at the time, was at the wheel of a Volkswagen Polo that collided with a transporter van on the N78 at Burtown, Co. Kildare.
Passengers Gemma Nolan, Niamh Doyle and Aisling Middleton, all 19, and Charmaine Carroll, 20, died almost instantly in the accident on January 6, 2015.
Dan Boland, prosecuting, yesterday told Naas Circuit Court it was the State’s case that two tyres on the Polo were not inflated to the correct level and that a heavy load in the car had led to it veering into the wrong A TRIAL of a woman accused of causing the death of four friends by dangerous driving has heard how her car ‘shot across the road’ into the wrong lane before colliding with a van. lane. The court was told Ms Kearney had little recollection of the collision and that the Polo’s NCT had expired at the time of the accident.
Witness Tracy Norton was travelling behind the van prior to the collision at around 9.45pm. Ms Norton noted the van slowed and had begun pulling into the hard shoulder. She believed the van was letting her pass but then noticed the oncoming Polo.
‘I saw the car swerving on the road. The car then straightened up,’ she said.
When the van pulled back out on to the road, Ms Norton said, the Polo ‘shot across the road’.
The passenger side of the car collided with the front of the van, the court was told. Ms Norton alerted the emergency services and ran to the car. ‘[Ms Kearney] was screaming,’ she said. ‘I tried to talk to her but she kept screaming.’ Garda Sergeant Donal O’Sullivan said he interviewed Ms Kearney around four months after the incident.
‘She was not available for interview beforehand because her injuries were so severe,’ he said.
In her statement to gardaí, she recalled travelling to Kilkenny to go ice-skating with her friends on the day of the incident.
Afterwards, the group had gone to McDonald’s before heading to Athy. Ms Kearney said she could recall leaving McDonald’s but not what occurred afterwards.
Ms Kearney said she was a provisional learner driver and was not displaying L plates at the time, the court heard.
Forensic collision investigator Garda Rachel Murdiff had noted scuff marks on the road which continued for 46 metres before the scene of the accident, but did not observe any brake marks.
The court was told the road had a 100kph limit but that speed was not a factor in the collision.
Roderick O’Hanlon SC, defending, raised an engineer’s report that found the reflective cat’s eyes on the road appeared to be above the recommended level of the road surface. He suggested the impact of the cat’s eye on the tyre would have had an exaggerated effect on steering.
Garda Murdiff did not dispute the report but said she would expect to see marks on the road if the tyre had hit a cat’s eye.
She had inspected the road and noticed no loose or jagged cat’s eyes, the court heard.
Van passenger Mariusz Wawrzos told the court the driving of the Polo was ‘very bad’ and said the collision had occurred ‘very fast’.
Ms Kearney, of Crossneen, Co. Carlow, denies causing death by dangerous driving. She has also pleaded not guilty to knowingly driving a defective vehicle.
The trial continues.