A WEEPING fiancee told a Dublin inquest yesterday that her husband to be fell to his death from a 13 storey Ballymun block of flats only two weeks after they announced their engagement.
William Parker (27), of Seatown Villas, Swords, was found by a passer by at the bottom of Thomas Clarke Tower after falling from a small balcony attached to a flat belonging to his girlfriend on August 27th last.
Ms Bernadette Pouch, a mother of two, told Dublin Coroner's Court that she and her boyfriend were engaged and had set a wedding date for November 27th. The night before he died he was in great form and they were talking about the wedding.
She had given him a blanket to sleep on the couch, as he often did. Since his death her seven year old daughter had told her that when she got up at 8.30 a.m. the following day her fiance had gone to her daughter's bedroom.
However, Ms Pouch said after gardai had contacted her, she went to her daughter's bedroom and found that he wasn't there. She found her daughter's bedroom window open and this window led out on to the balcony. She later found the key to the balcony door on the bedroom floor near the window.
She added: "Willie often climbed out this window and silently unlocked the balcony door from the outside and then jumped in on us in the living room, shouting `Boo'. He was forever messing."
"It must have been an accident. He was still on a high after setting the date for our wedding. He never drank or smoked and didn't take drugs," she added.
Garda Marie Courtney told the inquest that the deceased was found by a passer by. He was clothed in the trousers part of his tracksuit. She said there was no sign of foul play.
Recording a verdict of death by misadventure, Dr Brian Farrell, the Dublin city coroner, said: "There is no evidence this man intended to take his own life. This may have been an accident. I do not know if he was engaged in some prank, as he had done so before. If so, it was a terrible tragedy."