Man died after wife ‘panicked’ at traffic lights and crashed, inquest hears

A 68-year-old back seat passenger suffered a broken neck and later died after the car his wife was driving in struck a wall after she panicked.

Joseph Doyle from Dún Laoghaire, Co Dublin was going for lunch in Blackrock with his wife on April 23rd, 2017 when their car hit a wall.

The man's wife Margaret Doyle was trying to adjust the driver's seat while stopped at traffic lights on the Merrion Road at about 2pm. When the lights turned green, cars behind her began beeping, causing her to panic, an inquest at Dublin Coroner's Court heard.

The car had been adjusted for a disabled driver with controls for acceleration and brakes at the steering wheel.

“I thought I had time to move the seat at the lights,” Mrs Doyle said in her deposition. “In a panic I ended up driving into a wall.”

Mr Doyle was in the back seat and was not wearing his seat belt, according to Bridie Doyle, who was travelling in the front passenger seat.

“She went to adjust her seat. She took off then, she just panicked. Instead of the brake she pressed the accelerator and we hit the wall,” Bridie Doyle said.

Margaret Doyle was an inpatient at St Vincent's Hospital and had not driven her car, a Nissan Micra, for a while, the court heard.

“It’s believed there were cars behind beeping and this caused the driver to panic and press the accelerator instead of the brake. The car moved forward, mounted the footpath and hit the wall,” Garda Paul Nolan said.

The collision caused Mr Doyle to strike the seat in front of him and he sustained a broken neck.

He was paralysed as a result, unable to move his arms or legs.

He died in hospital on June 28th, 2017. The cause of death was pneumonia due to paralysis of all four limbs, due to a cervical spinal cord injury sustained in a road traffic collision two months earlier.

"The injury was apparent from the outset and everything that happened after that related to the neck injury," Coroner Dr Myra Cullinane said.

The jury returned a verdict of misadventure.