Coroner blasts disabled biker's machine following double fatality

A CORONER has blasted homemade modifications made to a disabled biker's motorcycle after it was involved in a fatal accident that killed two people.

One-armed biker Gordon Thackray, 58, died when his specially-modified motorbike crashed at a cross roads – seriously injuring his grandson and killing another motorcyclist, 45-year-old Mark Dossett, when the accident took place near Askwith, North Yorkshire on April 5th this year.

An inquest into the accident heard how Mr Thackray, who was riding a bike he had adapted so he could use it with one hand, ignored a give way sign and ploughed into Mr Dossett.

Coroner Geoff Fell told the inquest into the double fatal accident the modifications to Gordon Thackray’s 25-year-old bike made it a “Heath Robinson” contraption. However, Mr Thackray's bike had passed its MOT shortly before the crash.

Police crash investigator Steve Kirkbright told the inquest that, had he lived, it would have been “highly likely” Mr Thackray, of Valley Drive, Ilkley, would have been facing criminal charges of causing Mr Dossett’s death by careless driving.

Mr Fell recorded a verdict of unlawful killing on Mr Dossett and that Mr Thackray’s death was caused when he “failed to comply with a give way sign and as a consequence collided with a motorcycle on a major road”.