AN ARMIDALE coroner has called for a criminal negligence offence to be introduced for deaths resulting from non-compliant swimming pools.
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Coroner Karen Stafford handed down her findings yesterday afternoon in Armidale Coroner’s Court into the drowning death of a toddler after he wandered into the pool area of a neighbouring backyard in 2012.
Sebastien Yeomans was two-and-a-half when he was pulled from the water unconscious on May 14.
He died two days later in Newcastle’s John Hunter Hospital.
“Sebastien’s death was preventable,” Ms Stafford said in her findings.
“Sebastien was able to walk quietly and quickly from the yard of 20 Johnson St to the swimming pool at 47 Fletcher St because part of the fence dividing those two properties was down on the ground.
“This meant that there was an inadequate child barrier around the swimming pool.”
Ms Stafford has recommended the attorney-general introduce criminal negligence offences, similar to negligent driving charges, “to apply in circumstances where a person dies as a result of the negligence of a third party with respect to the maintenance or use of a private swimming pool”.
During a two-day inquest last month, the court heard the Yeomans’ neighbours, the Melvilles, had been “engaged in a dispute over a fence that divided their property from another neighbour, Phillip Cameron”.
“Sebastien walked over the dividing fence that was lying on the ground, partly covered with leaves,” Ms Stafford said.
Philip Cameron, the owner of the property, became the first person in Australia to be charged with manslaughter in relation to a drowning death.
But that charge was later dropped by the DPP, who said there was no reasonable prospect of conviction.
The inquest was told the pool had been the subject of past complaints to Armidale Dumaresq Council, but there were no pool inspections from 2010 to 2012 carried out by the council because of a lack of resources.
The court heard yesterday Sebastien was the “loving, happy and sociable child” of loving parents.
“He was the result of IVF treatment and his birth was a miracle that his family never thought they would experience,” Ms Stafford said.
In her findings, Ms Stafford praised the emergency services, including local police, detectives and paramedics, who were called to investigate the drowning.
She also acknowledged “the dignity shown by Leisa and Garry Yeomans” and hope the inquest “provided some opportunity to honour Sebastien”.
Ms Stafford has called for the maximum penalties to be increased for pool owners who breach safety requirements.
She has called on the Armidale council to “allocate sufficient staff to properly implement” a swimming pools inspection program.
She also recommended the council update its website to inform owners that the cost of building and maintaining a pool fence is the pool owner’s responsibility; and to look at producing pool safety information for residents.