A truck driver has sued alleging the Sunday World defamed him in an article about a fatal road traffic incident which left a man dead.
Stephen Kelly (36), a father of two from the Rower, Co Kilkenny, is suing over the July 2009 article which carried comments from the parents of Graham Norris, referring to Mr Kelly as having no mercy or sympathy over his death.
The article also said Mr Kelly “put on a show” during a criminal trial in which he was acquitted of dangerous driving causing death.
He was convicted of failing to have a road worthiness certificate for his vehicle and not having a proper under-running bar on the truck to prevent cars going underneath it.
Mr Norris, aged 26, died almost instantly when his car hit the truck and trailer which had gone on to its incorrect side of the road to do a difficult manoeuvre into a narrow off-road leading to a forest where Mr Kelly was to pick up timber.
It happened in darkness on the morning of October 12th, 2005, at Ashtown Cross, on the Lemybrien to Carrick-on-Suir Road, Co Waterford.
Claims
Mr Kelly claims the article meant, among other things, he conducted himself in a manner at his criminal trial which was false and misleading and the acquittal verdict was obtained by dishonesty and deceit.
Sunday Newspapers, publishers of the Sunday World, deny the claims and plead the words in the article were true.
Colman Cody SC (with Declan Doyle SC), opening Mr Kelly’s case, said the criminal trial in Waterford Circuit Court in 2007 resulted in the jury acquitting Mr Kelly of the dangerous driving causing death charge. Mr Kelly received fines for the lesser charges relating to the vehicle.
The Norris family later brought civil proceedings against Mr Kelly and the widow of the truck owner, Jim Lanigan of Inistioge, Co Kilkenny. That case was dealt with by the Lanigan’s insurance company and a settlement was reached which Mr Kelly had no hand, act or part in, counsel said.
In evidence, Mr Kelly said he wanted to go to Mr Norris’s funeral and apologise to his parents but after speaking to a man in the west of Ireland who had had a similar crash, he thought it was better not to do so.
Shortly after the incident, he said he met Mr Norris’s brother Victor who took issue with why he had not contacted his parents to apologise and told Victor he “did not know whether the family would talk to me or whether it would make things worse”.
Too late
“I told him I was very sorry and offered to visit his parents but he said it was too late. I left it at that”.
The family later set up a website about Mr Norris and put signs near Mr Kelly’s home giving the website address, he said. A sign near where the accident happened stated “killer lorry operating here”, with a picture of a lorry and Mr Kelly’s name.
When he saw the Sunday World article, he was shocked and upset, Mr Kelly said. He accepted he was found guilty of the lesser charges but said the manoeuvre he carried out the morning of the crash was "text book and there was no other way I could do it". He believed the Circuit Court jury understood that, he added.
Cross-examined by Eoin McCullough SC, for the newspaper, Mr Kelly said the manoeuvre was difficult but not dangerous. He agreed if he had waited another 10 minutes before doing it, it would have been daylight.
He disagreed a light at the side of his trailer, which at one stage completely blocked the road, was defective and another at the rear was covered in mud. All lights on the trailer were working, he said.
While reflective markings on the side of the trailer were “a bit dirty”, he disagreed they were extremely dirty or not visible.
The case continues before a jury and Mr Justice Michael White.