Road fatality case still on hold

A High Court order of a stay remains in place on the police bringing any criminal proceedings against Mark Ryan, the driver being investigated in the fatality case of Andrea Hughes.
The order was granted a year ago after the police published the findings of a coroner’s inquest, indicating who was culpable.
The lawyer representing Ryan, Hugh Marshall Jr, had challenged the findings and publication of the inquest report in August last year, preventing the police from moving forward in any way.
Marshall did not state what’s next for the case, just to confirm the court order still has effect.
It is now three and half years after Hughes was allegedly struck down on Weatherill’s main road.
She died leaving nine children.
In the meantime, Dane Hamilton, father to seven of those children, is expressing anguish over the delay, calling it an injustice because of their economic background and social standing.
“Because they have their money and their business and we are too small for them to deal with us. You don’t see how life is, that’s just how life is”, he said in an interview with OBSERVER media.
“The guy still on the road, still driving, every day he is in Cedar Grove playing tennis on the court and the kids see him every day,” said an irritated Hamilton.
The father of seven said he has been working tirelessly to ensure all his children have the requisite school supplies for the reopening of the new school year.
“Since she died, I have to work harder but every week I get pay, I try to buy something they need for school. I don’t wait for the last day to get everything”, he said.
The father said he has to assume the role of both parents to his children who are still distraught over the loss of their mother.
“All of them feel bad, every day they talk about their mother and the last one cries for her mother all the time,” he said.
“I have to be mother and father to them, I have to go out and work, take care of bills and still make sure they have food, clothes and shoes”.
Hamilton said his mother gives guidance to the children when he goes out to work but she is stricken in age so the older children have to take up the responsibility and help the smaller ones.
He maintains that his children are doing well and have developed a strong sibling bond to deal with the misfortune that befell them. “
There is a togetherness in the home, their mother died and they all know that so they stick together, that’s all [they] have to do now”. Four of Hamilton’s children attend the Princess Margaret Secondary while the remaining three attend the Cedar Grove Primary School.