Boy (9) who died in quad bike accident took vehicle without father’s permission, inquest told

A boy (9) who died from injuries sustained in an accident on a quad bike in Co Laois last year had taken the vehicle without his father’s permission, an inquest has heard.

Jokubas Sliosoras, originally from Lithuania, was pronounced dead at Temple Street hospital in Dublin on February 11th, 2021.

A sitting of Dublin City Coroner’s Court on Thursday heard the young boy had been transported by air ambulance from near his home in Dooary, Ballyroan, Co Laois, the morning before his death, after his father had discovered him lying in a field with a quad bike turned on its side.

In a written statement, the victim’s father, Donatos Sliosoras, said his family had finished breakfast at about 10.15am on February 10th.

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Mr Sliosoras said he believed his son had gone out to play with the two young daughters, aged nine and 12, of his friend, Ramunas Viscinis, who was staying in a mobile home on his property at the time. He said his wife, Vilama, asked him at 10.50am to check on their son.

Mr Sliosoras said he searched his yard after finding that Jokubas was not playing with his friend’s two daughters, and discovered that his Can-Am Outlander quad bike was missing from a shed. He said he went up a hill in a nearby field and found his son lying on the ground “unconscious with his eyes rolled back in his head”.

Mr Sliosoras said he put a jacket around the boy and ran back to his house to raise the alarm. He returned to his son and stayed with him until an ambulance crew arrived some 30 minutes later.

Mr Sliosoras said paramedics worked on his son until the ambulance brought him to a nearby GAA grounds, from where he was transported by helicopter to a hospital in Dublin.

HSE paramedic Frank O’Connor said the victim was making groaning noises, which suggested he might have suffered head injuries, but was otherwise unresponsive.

The inquest heard a forensic examination of the quad bike, whose mudguards were damaged, found no pre-collision, mechanical defects.

Gardaí who investigated the incident said the quad bike was used in the business on Mr Sliosoras’s property.

Coroner Clare Keane was told that Jokubas Sliosoras had only moved from Lithuania a few months earlier with his mother to join his father in Ireland, and was due to begin school the following September. Mr Sliosoras told gardaí that his son loved the quad bike but had only used it a few times so would not be familiar with its operation.

Gardaí were informed that the boy was only allowed to drive it under the strict supervision of his father. Mr Sliosoras said the vehicle was normally locked so that no child could use it. However, he had used it himself the previous evening and believed he had not locked it away.

Gardaí said the incident occurred on a field with a slope and they believed the young boy was not skilled enough to drive it safely at the location. The inquest heard there was no evidence that the boy had been wearing a safety helmet.

Sami Awadalla, the consultant paediatric surgeon who treated the boy at CHI Temple Street, said he had been under the quad bike for about an hour and had suffered a number of complications, including a blood clotting disorder, a build-up of acid due to kidney failure and cardiac tamponade (where the cavity around the heart fills with blood or other fluid).

Dr Awadalla said his deteriorating condition meant doctors were unable to perform surgery to treat the clotting disorder and he suffered a number of cardiac arrests in hospital before being pronounced dead.

Although neither of the boy’s parents were present in court, the coroner said the Sliosoras family were happy for the inquest to proceed in their absence.

Dr Keane said a postmortem had shown that the boy had died as a result of multiple traumatic injuries associated with the accident involving the quadbike.

She described details of the evidence as “heart-breaking” and observed how the fatal accident had happened “in the blink of an eye”.

Returning a verdict of accidental death, the coroner said the case was “particularly poignant” given how Jokubas Sliosoras had moved to Ireland and was looking forward to going to school.