AN inquest is expected to open today into the deaths of three men in a
collision between a car and a horse-box driven by former international
showjumper Harvey Smith.
Mr Smith was detained and questioned by police for more than four
hours after the accident on the slip road at the junction of the A1 and
the A59 York to Harrogate road on Saturday afternoon.
He was later released on police bail for a month, pending further
inquiries.
A six-year-old boy who was a passenger in the Ford Escort car was
seriously injured, but a teenager, also in the car, escaped with minor
cuts and bruises.
The North Yorkshire Coroner, Dr Sidney Jacobs, is expected to open the
hearing in the Magistrates Courthouse, Harrogate, to hear evidence
identifying the dead before adjourning the case for further inquiries.
Assistant Divisional Fire Officer Peter Turner, who attended the
accident, said it was as bad as he had seen for a long time.
''There was no wreckage strewn across the road, but the car itself was
extremely badly damaged,'' he added.
Police named the dead as Mr Andrew Gowland, 30, the car driver, of
Swarcliffe Towers, Leeds, Mr Gary Hayton, 31, of Garforth, Leeds, and Mr
Ernest Larvin, 37, of Knaresborough, Yorkshire.
Mr Larvin's son Daniel, six, suffered serious head injuries and was
said to be in a ''critical'' condition in Leeds General Infirmary, where
his mother Christina was by his bedside last night.
College student Andrew Fulcher, 17, of Knaresborough, was discharged
from hospital after treatment for minor injuries.
Speaking later about the crash which killed three of his friends, but
left him with only a cut finger, he said: ''I must be the luckiest man
alive.''
He had been sitting in the back seat alongside Daniel. ''I dived on to
the lad to try and save him. Looking after Danny was all I could think
of.
''Suddenly there was a terrific smash and I seemed to wake up with all
the wreckage and bodies around me.
''I was all right, just helpless and dazed.
Somehow I managed to open the rear door and jump out of the car.''
''I rolled down an embankment and wandered around not knowing where I
was.
''The horse-box filled the whole road and there was nowhere for the
driver to go,'' he said.
Mr Smith was driving home from a day at Catterick Races, North
Yorkshire, where his wife Sue had entered one of her horses, Harry's
Harvest, in the Bonusprint National Hunt Flat Race at 3.40.
Mr Smith, three assistants, and the two horses in their vehicle were
uninjured.
The dead men had all been to a football match at the North Yorkshire
village of Kirk Hammerton, and were returning after the game was
cancelled.
Mr Andrew Gowland, a printer who had been on the books of Halifax Town
when they were in league football, joined Hammerton United as a
midfielder this season. He had celebrated his 30th birthday hours before
the crash.
His brother Paul, 23, said yesterday he had been looking forward to a
birthday drink and game of snooker with Andrew when police arrived with
news of the tragedy.
The players had left the clubhouse 10 minutes before the crash. The
game against Bridge FC, of Selby, had been abandoned at half-time
because of a water-logged pitch.
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