MUM SLEEPS IN TRAGIC CRASH GIRL’S BED
Family agony as Kiara’s drink-drive killer is jailed for 5yrs
THE mother of a teenager killed by a drink-driver has slept in her daughter’s bed every night since the tragedy.
Kiara Baird, 19, and her friend 38-year-old Maria Wallace died when Dermot Dowd lost control of a car in Co Donegal in 2016.
The 24-year-old, who had been drinking before the crash, was jailed for five years on Friday.
Grieving Tracey Baird slept beside her daughter’s body during the wake.
She said: “I still haven’t left her room. I have slept there ever since.”
A GRIEVING mum has revealed how she has slept in her daughter’s bed since she was killed by a drink-driver and won’t change the room to keep her memory alive.
Tracey Baird wiped away tears as she paid tribute to her loving daughter Kiara who was just 19 when she died.
Kiara and friend Maria Wallace, 38, were killed by serial criminal Dermot Dowd on a country road in Co Donegal in 2016.
The women had just finished college and met Dowd in a bar in Ballybofey.
Just after 4pm on September 21, the 24-year-old drove Maria’s car at speed on the Glenfin Road narrowly avoiding a number of cars.
Dowd lost control of the Citroen car and struck a lamppost.
Both women were thrown from the car with Kiara being killed instantly while Maria was taken to hospital and passed away a short time later.
Dowd initially claimed to gardai that it was Maria who was driving the car.
He eventually admitted driving while over the legal alcohol limit, driving dangerously, having no licence and not being insured.
On Friday he was sentenced to six years in prison with the final 12 months suspended and also banned from
driving for 15 years. The mothers of both victims bravely gave victim impact statements and told how Dowd’s actions have changed their lives forever.
Tracey Baird told a hushed courtroom how she slept beside her daughter when her remains were taken back to the family home in Ballybofey.
She had identified Kiara’s body on the morning after the car crash.
Ms Baird said: “I remember not wanting it to be her. Kiara’s body arrived home that night and we laid her out in her bedroom for her wake.
“I slept beside her for them few nights and I still haven’t left her room. I have slept there ever since.
“Her clothes are still in her wardrobe and chest of drawers. Her bath towel still hangs where she left it.”
Ms Baird said she will never forget the day her daughter had died.
She added: “It was a Wednesday, like any other. I had met Kiara while I was driving my younger daughter to school, it was around 1pm.
“It was pouring rain, so I pulled into a near by parking space beside her. I told her to get into the car, she was soaking wet.
“She said she had just finished her course and she was going for a drink with her course mate, Maria. Maria had been upset and she wanted to stay with her. She said, ‘I’ll be grand, Ma, I’ll be home in a while’. I just said, ‘I’ll see you later and I love you, mind yourself. I’ll have your dinner ready’.
“That was the last time I saw Kiara alive.”
Ms Baird thinks about why she had not persuaded her daughter to get into the car. She said: “I should have told her to phone me so I could collect her. I should have phoned her when I got home to make sure she was OK. I shouldn’t have made her start her new course in hospitality.
“I shouldn’t have ever moved her to Donegal.”
The family had decided to make that move because the area they lived in Dublin was “getting rough and hazardous”.
Ms Baird added: “We moved to Donegal. Kiara was not happy, but I told her it was a new life for us.
“I just wanted a better life for her and her brother. It was a hard move for all of us, but I thought at the time it was for the best.” Ms Baird had been diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer and at seven months pregnant had a C-section so she could start chemotherapy straight away.
She said: “It was a hard time for all of us, but we got through it as a family. I was given the all-clear in January 2016.
“I thought of the possibility of me dying and now I think now maybe it should have been me. I was the one who was sick, Kiara was full of life and was only starting to live.”
In her victim impact statement, she said the loss of Kiara was like nothing she had ever experienced before.
“It’s like something broke into my chest and just ripped out my heart. I can never tell her how sorry I am, or how much I
My darling Maria will never see how well her boys are doing or see them get married MARY MCGONAGLE ON THE IMPACT OF LOSING HER DAUGHTER
love and miss her. I can never again just hug her and hold her, tell her how proud I am of her and how losing her has had a huge impact on our family and friends.”
On the day of the crash, Ms Baird and her son Cian had gone to collect her other daughter Kayleigh from school.
She added: “A Garda car was outside and two gardai were walking towards us. We were asked who we were and they politely asked to go back to the house.
“I got really nervous and started calling for my partner, Karl. I knew there was something wrong.
“A Garda said, ‘There’s been a crash’. I immediately thought of my mam and her partner, who was out shopping. ‘It’s Kiara,’ he said. My heart stopped. I jumped up as I immediately wanted to go to her, but this was not to be. It wasn’t real, it could not be real. My baby girl could not be gone.”
She said she had an anxious wait because the gardai had asked her to remain at the house.
Ms Baird said: “Not knowing at the time my baby girl was lying not five minutes’ walk away from our home.
“It will always play on my mind how close she was to home and why I listened and didn’t go to look for her.”
Meanwhile, Maria’s mother Mary Mcgonagle was heartbroken at losing her so suddenly after her first daughter had died in a cot death, aged just seven months. She added: “So when I gave birth to Maria, I poured every bit of love in my body on her.”
She revealed how Maria, a mum of three boys, battled cancer twice but will never see her sons grow up. Ms Mcgonagle said: “My darling Maria will never see how well her boys are doing, she will never see them getting married and she will never hold any grandchildren in her arms.”
Ms Mcgonagle was delighted when Maria went back to her studies but now wishes she never started the course.
She added: “When she started college, I told her how proud I was of her every day but I also told her not to get used or to be taken for granted.
“Now I wish she had never started college and she would still be here with me.
“I can no longer listen to music or watch things on TV that we used to watch together.”
I got really nervous and called for my partner, Karl. I knew something was wrong TRACEY BAIRD WHEN GARDAI ARRIVED AT THE HOUSE