A 43-YEAR-OLD car dealer whose careless driving caused the death of a Fermanagh pensioner and injured three others including his own wife in a three-vehicle smash, was today freed on the maximum of 240 hours community service, and given a three-year driving ban.

Freeing Damien Maguire, from Knockonny Road, Ballygawley, Judge Neil Rafferty QC told the devastated family of 69-year-old pensioner, and well-known retired restaurateur, Eileen Maguire, "nothing I can say or do can bring back Eileen Maguire" or which could heal or cure the hurt caused that November evening in 2013, outside Fivemiletown.

In all of the circumstances the Dungannon Crown Court judge said he was "left with the firm view that justice cannot be served by a sentence of four months" and taking advice of senior Law Lords, and having stood back and thought "very long and hard", he would impose the community service order.

In addition to his guilty plea to causing the pensioner's death, Maguire also admitted causing grievous bodily injury to Mrs Maguire’s husband James, their son Connor and his own wife Joanne, as a result of the collision on the Belfast Road in Fivemiletown on 1 November 2013.

Those injuries, said the judge, have been both "serious and life-changing".

The car dealer, added the judge, was also injured, but "there was absolutely nothing prior to this that was remarkable to the defendant's driving in any way. He was driving at a safe distance and within the speed limit".