BUILDER GIVEN THREE YEAR JAIL SENTENCE

Manslaughter of young building worker ends in prison for builder

Two men have been jailed after a 15-year-old labourer was crushed to death by a wall on a building site north of London.

Adam Gosling died of head injuries when a wall collapsed in April 2007. He was earning £25 a day working on the building site with his older brothers. 

Builder Colin Holtom and contractor Darren Fowler had previously been convicted at the Old Bailey of offences following the death of Adam Gosling.

Holtom, aged 64 of Latchingdon, Essex, was jailed for three years after pleading guilty to manslaughter. 

Fowler, aged 47 of Upminster, had admitted working while disqualified from being a company manager and failure to discharge a duty imposed by the HSW Act. He was jailed for 12 months for working while disqualified.

The court heard that Adam had been doing some casual work for Colin Holtom, who traded as Maldon Groundworks. Holtom was sub-contracted to carry out a large garden landscaping and refurbishment project and the project manager for the site was Darren Fowler.

Judge Moss told Holtom: “You adopted a cavalier and thoroughly irresponsible attitude to the brothers’ safety. Your actions – or lack of them – on that day were criminal.” Mark Gosling, father of Adam said in an impact statement: “Adam had his life stolen from him before it had started” and that Holtom had shown “no remorse”.

Comment: This prosecution of Holtom was for the offence of gross negligence manslaughter. These cases are taken in respect of individuals where “…the facts must be such that, in the opinion of the jury, the negligence of the accused went beyond a mere matter of compensation between subjects and showed such disregard for the life and safety of others, as to amount to a crime against the State and conduct deserving punishment.”

A first prosecution under the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 is still awaited. We understand a number of deaths are under investigation and a that prosecution can be expected in the next 12 months. 

This article was posted on 20th July 2009 in ALL LATEST NEWS, MANSLAUGHTER, PROSECUTIONS, collapse structure.
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One Response to “BUILDER GIVEN THREE YEAR JAIL SENTENCE”

  1. WALL COLLAPSE TRAPS WORKMAN | PP Construction Safety News Desk Says:
    August 26th, 2009 at 7:37 am

    [...] the second most common cause of fatalities is where workers are asphyixated or suffer traumatic injury when excavations, walls, floors or [...]

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