Builder gets three years after labourer killed by falling wall

A builder was today jailed for three years for the manslaughter of a teenage labourer who was the youngest person on record killed on a construction site

Adam Gosling, 15, was crushed to death by a collapsing wall in April 2007 when left to work unsupervised by boss Colin Holtom.

He died instantly from massive head injuries when the wall fell on him as he worked as a £25-a-day labourer in the grounds of a north London mansion.

Holtom had left Adam and his brother Dean, 18, to knock down the unstable seven-metre long structure by an outdoor swimming pool at a property in Hadley Wood.

The 64-year-old, of Meadow Way, Latchingdon, Essex, was said to have had a "laissez faire" attitude to safety.

He pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey last week to a charge of manslaughter by gross negligence.

Judge Christopher Moss today told him: "You adopted a cavalier and thoroughly irresponsible attitude to the brothers' safety."

Martyn Bowyer, prosecuting, said that as a 15-year-old Adam should never have been allowed to carry out such work, while Holtom had failed to provide safety equipment such as hard hats or steel-capped boots.

He told the court: "He is the youngest person to be killed on a construction site that the Health and Safety Executive are aware of and he simply should not have been employed to do what he did at that age."

Darren Fowler, 47, a contractor of Parkland Avenue, Essex, was jailed for 12 months after he admitted breaching health and safety law and running a company while disqualified from being a director.