'An exceptionally sad case' - store pleads guilty to health & safety breaches after mirror crushes boy, 4

Austen Harrison, 4, died in hospital after being injured at the designer store in Bicester

A firm has pleaded guilty to two offences under Health and Safety laws following the death of a 4-year-old boy after a heavy mirror fell on top of him in a shop in Oxfordshire.

The firm Hugo Boss UK Limited is being prosecuted by Cherwell District Council after the death of Austen Harrison in June 2013. The 4-year-old from Crawley in Sussex was visiting the Hugo Boss store in the Bicester Village outlet with his parents. He was crushed by an unsecured 18-stone wall mirror in the changing rooms. Austen was left with irreparable brain damage and his life support machine was turned off at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital four days later on 8 June 2013.

The two guilty pleas to offences under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 were entered on the company's behalf by Jonathan Laidlaw QC at Banbury Magistrates Court on Tuesday 2nd June 2015.

Barry Berlin, who was prosecuting on behalf of Cherwell District Council, told District Judge David Chinery that while Hugo Boss could be sentenced in the magistrates’ court, his clients did not believe that the maximum fine of £20,000 per offence was tough enough.

He suggested the case should be sentenced in the crown court where the fine could be greater, with the recommended starting point of a £100,000 fine per offence being imposed or surpassed by an even higher fine.

The District Judge agreed that a more severe penalty was required and adjourned the case for sentencing at Oxford Crown Court on the provisional date of the 19th June 2015.

An inquest held into Austen's death at Oxford's County Hall in March 2015, heard that the mirror had been placed in the changing room area several months before Austen and his parents visited the store.

The inquest jury returned a narrative verdict, stating that the mirror should have been fixed to the wall and the wall should have been reinforced. The coroner Darren Salter meanwhile, described the incident as “an accident waiting to happen”.