A television commentator and former Mayo and Donegal footballer, Mr Martin Carney, was a key witness in a claim for damages in Dublin Circuit Civil Court yesterday by two children, who suffered facial injuries in separate falls while on holiday in Menorca, Spain.
Mr Carney told Judge Liam Devally he was in an apartment adjacent to Mr Ian and Mrs Susan Hood and their children in May 1996 when Grant Hood (7) fell spread-eagled almost two metres from a garden level on to a pathway.
He told Mr Eoin McCullough, counsel for the family, that Grant fell on his face and he felt his neck might be broken. As he was helping Grant he saw the boy's sister, Rachael (9), somersault downwards in an almost carbon-copy fall.
Judge Devally, who heard there was no fence to prevent children falling off the garden level, held that the holiday firm, Thomson Holidays, Hatch Street, Dublin, which no longer used the Son Blanc apartments where the accidents occurred, was negligent.
Awarding Grant £10,000 and Rachael £7,500, he said facial injuries suffered by both had left slight permanent scarring.