The mother of a four-year-old boy who was killed when hit by a construction vehicle in Ballymun, north Dublin, said at an inquest that the building company did not inform residents that construction vehicles would be operational on the day of the fatal accident.
PJ Carey Contractors Ltd had promised to keep local residents informed when all construction work was scheduled to take place, she added.
"They promised that all construction work would be done in consultation with us. That day it was not. No one in either tower block was made aware that there was to be work going on that day," Joan Landy told Dublin City Coroner's Court yesterday.
Alex Cuthbert, Eamon Ceannt Tower, Ballymun, died in August 2001 when he was hit yards from his home by a reversing construction vehicle working on the Ballymun regeneration project.
Sgt Tom Lillis told the court that PJ Carey Contractors did not consider the minor work on the day of the accident significant enough to warrant notification of local residents. "They were saying that it was not construction work per se." He added that it was his understanding that the company had agreed to keep local residents briefed. No representative from PJ Carey's attended the inquest yesterday.
The coroner's court heard that two vehicles may have hit Alex as he played with a paper aeroplane yards from a children's play area outside his home in Ballymun. A digger and a pick-up truck had been carrying out minor work on the road beside where many children were playing. The pick-up truck was reversing backwards down the narrow road when it struck Alex.
Brendan D'Mellow, the driver of the truck, said he was not aware that he had hit someone until a child ran up to his vehicle shouting at him to stop. "When I reversed back I looked over my shoulder and in the rear-view mirror all the way . . . I reversed at normal speed. There was no racing involved with the driver of the dumper. When I was reversing I did not see anyone. I don't know if it was me that hit him or the other vehicle."
Mr D'Mellow, an Australian national, was not present at the inquest yesterday and is no longer living in Ireland. Det Garda Ronan Murtagh told the court that a sample of blood was found on one of the front wheels of the truck.
Helen Moore, who saw the accident from her balcony in Ballymun, said she saw the digger and not the truck strike Alex. Sgt Lillis said it "points that way"; that the two vehicles may have struck Alex.
A postmortem found that Alex died instantaneously from a "severe head injury and fatal damage to the brain stem".
A jury recorded a verdict of accidental death.