{"id":772337,"date":"2026-09-16T09:02:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T09:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/772337\/"},"modified":"2026-09-16T09:02:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T09:02:15","slug":"noah-donohoe-storm-drain-should-be-condemned-as-a-death-trap-says-family-solicitor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/772337\/","title":{"rendered":"Noah Donohoe: Storm drain should be condemned as a death trap, says family solicitor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The culvert where 14-year-old Noah Donohoe was found dead should be &#8220;condemned as a death trap&#8221;, according to Fiona Donohoe&#8217;s solicitor Niall Murphy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">On Tuesday, the jury in the Noah Donohoe inquest found it was possible, but not probable, that failings by the Department of Infrastructure (DfI) over the tunnel in which he was found dead contributed to his death.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The jury found that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/ck20lgjx9y3yo\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the DfI had failed to identify a hazard at the site<\/a>, which it maintains, and that there was no warning sign.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">They also found numerous failings in the Police Service of Northern Ireland&#8217;s (PSNI&#8217;s) investigation, but that these did not contribute to the schoolboy&#8217;s death.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">On Wednesday, Murphy said it was apparent that a child could have &#8220;navigated the width&#8221; of the bars outside the drain entrance, which has since been &#8220;recognised and rectified&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;In mature reflection, this storm drain can be condemned as a death trap because that&#8217;s what it was and the inquest took a very methodical and deep examination of the history of the installation of that storm drain,&#8221; he told BBC Radio Ulster&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sounds\/play\/live\/bbc_radio_ulster\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Good Morning Ulster<\/a> programme.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In a statement issued on Tuesday evening, Infrastructure Minister Liz Kimmins said her thoughts were with Noah&#8217;s family, and that she &#8220;unreservedly&#8221; accepts the findings of the inquest.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;As minister, I will make sure the department does everything it needs to ensure all lessons are learned,&#8221; she added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The culvert where 14-year-old Noah Donohoe was found dead should be &#8220;condemned as a death trap&#8221;, according to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":772338,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-772337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/772337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=772337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/772337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/772338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=772337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=772337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=772337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}