Couple awarded €291,000 after dampness ruins dream home

Tallansfield Manor in Tallanstown

A local couple have been awarded €291,000 after the High Court heard their newly constructed dream home turned into a nightmare because of dampness, which eventually forced them to leave it.

Dolores and Stephen Nimmo sued Ardee-based builders Mulreid Construction Ltd over its failure to install a proper damp course on the new two-storey over basement house at Tallansfield Manor in Tallanstown.

The couple paid Mulreid €326,000 to build the house, which they moved into in May 2006.

According to The Irish Independent, the court was told that instead of a proper damp course, a thin plastic barrier similar to a radon barrier, was put in during construction of the foundation with the result that dampness seeped into the house.

Judgment was entered last year against Mulreid Construction in absence of a defence and yesterday the case came before Mr Justice John Hedigan for assessment of damages. There was no appearance for Mulreid yesterday.

The judge said it was the type of case relating to poor quality building that was too often before the courts. It was supposed to be the Nimmos’ dream home but it turned out to be a nightmare and he was sorry for the trouble they had endured.

He awarded them €131,609 for the cost of repairing the damp problem along with €160,000 for trauma and suffering.

Mrs Nimmo told the court that she, her husband and three children had moved from Dublin to Tallanstown into what they expected would be a dream home.

The house was very costly to heat and there were a number of other problems which Mrs Nimmo brought to the attention of Mulreid’s Shane Rogers who himself lived in one of the houses in the small Tallanstown development.

He initially said he would deal with the problems but eventually refused to engage with her and she decided to take legal action.

Mrs Nimmo said the family lived in the house for six years before deciding to move out.

They employed a building surveyor who inspected the house in 2008 and found extensive damp mould growth in the basement.

The expert, who said a radon barrier type plastic membrane rather than a proper damp course was installed in the house, believed the damp problem could be rectified at a total cost of €131,609.

Rogers felt he crossed the line before taking his own life

The late Shane Rogers

A man who took his own life while in custody after confessing to shooting dead another man told gardaí that there was a “thin line” and he had “crossed it”, an inquest has heard.

Shane Rogers (32) from Deery’s Terrace in Inniskeen, Co Monaghan, was speaking to Sgt Kieran Moore having handed himself in after he fatally shot Crossmaglen GAA player James Hughes (35) in an incident near Dundalk on the night of December 11, 2011.

He died after hanging himself in a holding cell at Cloverhill Courthouse following a remand hearing on December 20, 2011.

A report into the incident released earlier this year found that he had not been checked for almost an hour before he was found.

The inquest into his death at Dublin Coroner’s Court heard that nine days earlier Mr Rogers spoke to Sergeant Kieran Moore shortly after 4am and said he had shot two people and thought they were dead.

Mr Rogers was speaking in a “calm voice”, he said.

He told Sgt Moore that he had been sitting at a bridge for the previous ten minutes “with the barrel of his shotgun in his mouth” but “couldn’t do it” and wanted to hand in the weapon.

Mr Rogers drove to Carrickmacross Garda Station and was met by Sgt Moore who cautioned him.

“It’s a thin line, it’s a thin line and I crossed it tonight,” he said.

When Sgt Moore retrieved the gun, it was loaded. When he removed the cartridge Mr Rogers told him: “that was the one for me but I didn’t have the balls”.

Mr Rogers was subsequently charged with the murder of Mr Hughes and taken to Cloverhill Prison where he was held on a wing for vulnerable inmates.

The court heard that he told a number of people that he intended to take his own life following his arrest. Sgt Moore said that he overheard Mr Rogers talking to his sister in Australia and telling her not to come home right away but to “wait for his funeral”.

He also heard him tell other family members that he was remorseful and would like to die, said Sgt Moore.

While being assessed on his committal to prison by nurse officer Elaine Dunne, Mr Rogers said that he felt remorseful and full of regret. “He didn’t see a bright future for himself. He was not able to guarantee his safety,” she said.

He later told his cellmate Uja Iwo that he wanted to kill himself. However, Mr Iwo told the court that Mr Rogers subsequently told him that he had “changed his mind”.

When he was assessed by GPs and the psychiatric team at Cloverhill Prison, he denied any intention to harm himself. Community mental health nurse Fintan Caddow said that Mr Rogers told him that “those thoughts had passed”.

However, it was decided not to move him to the general prison population.

He was moved to a shared cell in the vulnerable wing due to ongoing concerns for his safety and well-being and he remained on close observation while there.

The inquest continues.

Source: Shane Rogers took his own life after confessing to shooting dead James Hughes (Irish Mirror)

No prosecution to arise from Rogers suicide

Shane Rogers

There will be no prosecution arising from an incident in which a man accused of murder hanged himself in his cell shortly after a court appearance.

Shane Rogers (32) from Deery Terrace, Inniskeen, Co Monaghan, had been charged with the murder of Armagh GAA footballer James Hughes when he took his own life in his cell shortly after appearing before Cloverhill District Court on December 20th, 2011.

At Dublin Coroner’s Court, Inspector Frank Kennefick said that the Garda investigation into Mr Rogers’s death had been completed and a file submitted to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).

The response received by gardaí indicated that the DPP believed that there was no offence disclosed in the file and as a result no prosecutions will follow, he said. The inspector of prisons has also completed an investigation into the incident, he added, leaving the way clear to set a date for the inquest.

Mr Rogers was in prison on remand and on suicide watch for just more than a week when the incident happened. He faced charges in relation to the fatal shooting of Mr Hughes at Carrickmacross Road, Dundalk, nine days earlier as he travelled in a taxi with Mr Rogers’s former girlfriend. She was also injured in the incident. Mr Rogers presented himself at Carrickmacross Garda station after the murder.

Coroner Dr Brian Farrell set a date for a full hearing into the death on September 18th.

Source: The Irish Times