Farming firm to face trial after teacher killed by cow
A FARMING company has pleaded not guilty to a health and safety offence after a primary school teacher was killed by a cow while on holiday.
Marian Clode, from Ashton-underLyne, died while on an Easter break in Northumberland with her family on April 3, 2016.
They were staying at a holiday cottage at Swinhoe Farm, around two miles north west of the village of Belford. Ms Clode, 61, is said to have been killed by a stampeding cow.
JM Nixon & Son, based at Swinhoe Farm in Belford, is charged with ‘failing to ensure the health and safety of persons other than employees by failing to conduct an undertaking in such a way as to ensure, as far as reasonably practical, persons not in employment who may have been affected thereby were not exposed to risks to their safety from the movement of cattle.’
Alistair Nixon, 62, appeared at Newcastle Crown Court and pleaded not guilty on behalf of the partnership, the M.E.N’s sister paper, the Newcastle
Chronicle, reports. Judge Paul Sloan KC set a trial date for November 27 next year with a time estimate of eight days.
Ms Clode, a primary school teacher, had been on holiday with her husband Christopher, daughter Lucy, son-inlaw Kevin and two grandchildren, aged seven and eight. In a statement at the time Mrs Clode’s family said the mother-of-three was a ‘hardworking and dedicated teacher,’ who ‘lived for her family’ and ‘adored and doted on her four grandchildren.’
They added: “It’s heartbreaking she never got to see them grow up, or meet her fifth grandchild.”