Roy Collins’s father is sued over death of grandmother
Woman, 89, was accidentally run over as car reversed in car park
HIGH Court proceedings have been issued against Steve Collins, the father of murdered man Roy Collins, after he accidentally knocked down and reversed over an 89-year-old woman, causing fatal injuries.
The civil proceedings, seeking personal damages, have been made by Conor O’Sullivan, 26, a grandson of the deceased Maura O’Brien, of Milford Grange, Castletroy, Co. Limerick, who was with her the morning she died.
The woman’s inquest previously heard that Mr O’Sullivan drove his grandmother to the bank on the day of the accident, as she was due to arrange her finances to visit her younger sister, and he waited in the car for her.
When he observed Mr Collins’s reversing and then stopping, he got out of his car and asked Mr Collins if he had hit his grandmother, after he could not see her. He said that he then saw his grandmother’s hand and observed that she was under the jeep.
He was ‘distraught’ and a number of people tried to comfort him at the scene.
Witnesses said Mr Collins was also ‘visibly distraught’.
Time has now been extended for the case to go to hearing, after the proceedings were issued last November, nine months following the fatal accident.
Mr Collins declined to comment after a jury brought in a verdict of accidental death during an inquest at Limerick Coroner’s Court.
The jury recorded the verdict in accordance with the medical evidence, which found the mother-of-four and grandmother-of-six died as a result of multiple skull fractures.
Coroner John MacNamara heard that Ms O’Brien was struck by the vehicle, a Range Rover, driven by Mr Collins at the Ulster Bank car park in Castletroy, shortly after 10am on February 17, 2016.
Robin Lee, solicitor for the woman’s family, said the deceased was ‘no match’ for the vehicle, irrespective of the speed at which it was travelling.
Mr Lee said there was no evi dence that Ms O’Brien may have fallen at the scene and thus been out of the view of the driver.
The condition of the road surface also gave no reason to suggest she suffered a stumble or fall, he added.
According to a number of witnesses, Ms O’Brien was walking behind Mr Collins’s vehicle, when he slowly reversed back and knocked her down, before rolling over her.
Mr Collins earlier spoke of his ‘horror’ at the incident and was treated for shock.
He said that his camera sensor, at the rear of the vehicle, ‘did not pick up anything’. He told Limerick Coroner’s Court he would have been aware of his ‘surroundings because of my situation – I have been taught to be aware’.
Mr Collins and his family were in a witness protection programme outside Ireland after he testified against members of the Dundon-McCarthy crime gang, who murdered his son Roy, a 35-year-old father-of-two, in April 2009.
‘I was panicking as I didn’t know how to help her. It was a very upsetting scene. It was traumatic,’ Mr Collins said.
After an investigation, gardaí prepared a file for the Director of Public Prosecutions, who directed that no prosecution be brought.
Inspector Michael Reidy, who examined the vehicle, said it was in good mechanical order and found ‘there were no issues with the vehicle which could have contributed to the collision’.
Garda Conor McDermott, a forensic collision investigator, said there was no evidence that the victim cried out or shouted at the scene, according to others in the car park at the time. Nor was there evidence Mr Collins reversed with excessive speed, he said.
‘I was panicking. It was traumatic’