A MART operator has been ordered to pay €10,000 in personal damages to a young female Limerick dairy farmer from injuries she sustained after a one ton bull escaped from a pen at Ennis Mart five years ago.
At Ennis Circuit Court, Judge Colin Daly ordered Clare Co-Operative Marts to pay Rose Keating (28) €10,000 for the incident on May 25, 2017 that left three other people injured by the Charolais bull.
Judge Daly stated that the appropriate general damages in the case was €20,000. However, he halved the pay-out to €10,000 after finding that Ms Keating was 50 per cent responsible for the injuries she suffered.
He said that on the balance of probabilities Ms Keating opened the latch to the pen that allowed the bull escape.
In evidence, Ms Keating had denied opening the gate.
Judge Daly made the award after Ms Keating earlier rejected a settlement offer by Clare Co-Operative Marts.
This was after he told counsel for Clare Co-Operative Marts, Sandra Barnwell, that her client should consider its position after hearing an outline of the case against them.
An internal report by Clare Co-Operative Marts recorded that “a major accident” took place on the morning of May 25, 2017 where three people were injured by a bull including two who were badly injured.
Counsel for Ms Keating, Emmet O’Brien, told the court that Ms Keating has an extensive land-holding at Manister, Croom, County Limerick and qualified as a solicitor in January.
He said she is a full-time farmer and has 50 dairy cows and 100 dry cattle.
In evidence, Ms Keating recalled that she was in the process of opening the gate to the pen when the bull “burst out and came out on top of me”.
She said she “got the full force of the gate” and the bull continued on up on the ramp where he injured three others.
“I was very thrown back. I was in shock,” she added.
She told the court that she suffered injuries to her back and wrist.
However she didn’t report her injuries to the mart and didn’t go her GP for six months as she “is quite pain resistant”.
In his judgement, Judge Daly stated that the bull charged and caused the gate to strike Ms Keating “and slammed her against the wall”.
“It was the mart’s custom and practice at that time not to have any drovers or personnel working in this area. As a consequence of this incident, others were injured – some seriously.”
He said he had to take into account the fact that Ms Keating did not attend her GP for six months after the accident and after she received legal correspondence from the mart.
Judge Daly stated that in response to the letter from Clare Co-Operative Marts that alleged that she may have been responsible for the bull escaping, Ms Keating put Clare Marts on notice that she suffered injuries and was reserving her position in relation to the proceedings.
He said he was satisfied that Ms Keating and her late father “were not supervised when unloading their animals into what the Mart General Manager agreed ‘was a dangerous situation’”.
Judge Daly stated that the dangerous situation is the mixing of animals from different farms in the holding pen. He was also satisfied to find Ms Keating was not supervised when she attempted to remove her animals.
“It was easily foreseeable that an accident of this type could occur and that there were insufficient measures in place by the mart to prevent this from happening.”
He added that his conclusion was supported by the mart erecting signs in the area and procedural changes implemented within 12 months of the accident.
He was satisfied that the back and wrist injuries suffered by Ms Keating were soft tissue injuries and at the lower end of the scale.
In evidence, Clare Co-Operative Marts General Manager, Martin McNamara said that the first time he was made aware that Ms Keating suffered an injury was through correspondence from the Personal Injury Assessment Board (PIAB) in March 2019.
Mr McNamara confirmed to the court that another man injured on the day had also sued the mart and that case was resolved.
Judge Daly awarded costs against Clare Co-Operative Marts.
