Higgins Homes and Four Workers Face Trial Over Death of Mother Struck by Falling Bricks in Bow

A corporate manslaughter trial has opened at the Old Bailey in London, centering on the death of a 29-year-old mother who was struck by a load of falling bricks as she walked along a street in east London. Michaela Boor was on the school run on the morning of 27 March 2018 when the incident occurred on Burdett Road in Bow. She suffered a fractured skull and died two days later in hospital. The case has taken more than eight years to reach a courtroom, an unusually long delay that itself raises questions about the pace of investigations into workplace fatalities.

The defendant, Higgins Homes, the principal contractor and designer of a residential development under construction at the time, is charged with corporate manslaughter and a health and safety offence. Four construction workers contracted by the company face identical charges. They are Thomas Anstis, 69, of Banstead in Surrey; Stephen Coulson, 69, of Hemel Hempstead in Hertfordshire; Dawood Maan, 61, of Ashford in Kent; and Alexander McInnes, 34, of Islington, north London. Both the company and the four men deny all charges. The trial, presided over by a judge at the Old Bailey, is expected to examine in detail the lifting operations, risk assessments and chain of oversight that governed work at the site.

Opening the prosecution case on Monday, Alexandra Healy KC told jurors that Boor had been walking towards a row of shops with her friend, Chelsea Mustafa, when the pallet of bricks fell. The two women were following a route that took them past the construction site, which was being developed by Higgins Homes plc. According to the prosecution, the pallet was being transported by a tower crane towards a loading bay located immediately beside the pavement along Burdett Way when it came loose. The court heard that the load caught on scaffolding as it was hoisted, which dislodged the bricks and sent them plummeting to the ground below.

Healy told the jury that the crane operator, McInnes, had only a restricted view of the load during the lift, and that the operation effectively became a "blind lift" when the pallet moved completely out of his line of sight. This detail is likely to form a central plank of the prosecution's argument that the lifting operation was fundamentally unsafe. The term "blind lift" refers to a crane movement in which the operator cannot directly see the load, a scenario that industry guidance says requires particular precautions, including the use of a banksman or signaler and a carefully controlled exclusion zone.

The court heard that Mustafa ran into the road to escape the falling debris. Although some bricks struck her on the back and hand, she managed to avoid the bulk of the load. Boor, however, was unable to get clear of the pavement. She was hit by the falling bricks, which fractured her skull and caused what the prosecutor described as catastrophic brain injuries. She received emergency treatment at the scene before being taken to the Royal London Hospital, but jurors were told her injuries were unsurvivable. She was pronounced dead on 29 March 2018, two days after the incident.

The prosecution alleges that no risk assessment had been carried out for lifting pallets of bricks so close to members of the public, and that Higgins Homes had failed to consider the safety of people outside the site boundary. "Higgins Homes failed to give proper consideration to the protection of the public," Healy told the court. That allegation goes to the heart of the corporate manslaughter charge, which requires the prosecution to show that the way in which the company's activities were managed or organised caused a person's death and amounted to a gross breach of a relevant duty of care.

The four individual defendants occupied distinct roles in the project. Anstis, 69, was the senior site manager and temporary work co-ordinator, responsible for running the site and overseeing the work of subcontractors. The prosecutor claimed there was evidence that he "cut corners" in order to "save cost," an assertion that, if accepted by the jury, could prove significant in establishing whether safety was subordinated to financial considerations. Coulson, 69, was a director of Coulson Lifting Services and had responsibility for lifting services; he was not present at the site on the day of the incident. Maan, 61, was the crane supervisor tasked with overseeing and supervising lifting operations. McInnes, 34, was the crane operator at the controls when the bricks fell.

The case is being heard against the backdrop of a broader national conversation about construction safety. The Health and Safety Executive has repeatedly warned that lifting operations near public spaces represent one of the highest-risk activities on urban building sites, particularly in dense residential areas where pavements run directly alongside hoisting zones. Industry guidance typically requires that such areas be fenced off, that pedestrian routes be diverted, and that lifts over or near public rights of way be subject to specific, documented risk assessments. The prosecution's case appears to rest on the contention that these safeguards were absent or inadequate.

For the family of Michaela Boor, the trial represents the first public airing of the circumstances surrounding her death in a formal legal setting. Corporate manslaughter prosecutions are relatively rare in England and Wales, and convictions of companies remain fewer still, in part because the offence requires proof of a gross breach of duty at a senior management level. The presence of four individual co-defendants alongside the corporate entity is also notable, reflecting the Crown Prosecution Service's willingness to pursue personal as well as corporate accountability in fatal workplace incidents.

The trial continues. Jurors are expected to hear detailed technical evidence about crane operations, scaffolding, loading procedures and site management practices. The outcome will depend on whether the prosecution can persuade the court that the defendants' conduct fell so far below the standards reasonably expected that it amounted to a criminal breach, rather than a tragic accident. For now, the court has heard only the opening of a case that seeks to establish responsibility for the death of a young mother who was simply walking down a street on an ordinary March morning.

The case has also drawn attention to the wider issue of public safety at construction sites in London, where rapid redevelopment has placed cranes and lifting equipment in close proximity to busy pavements, schools and shops. Campaigners have long argued that the safety of pedestrians, rather than only site workers, is too often an afterthought in the planning and oversight of urban construction projects. Whether this trial results in convictions or acquittals, it is likely to intensify scrutiny of how contractors manage the risks their operations pose to those who never set foot inside the site hoardings.

The Old Bailey proceedings are expected to continue over the coming weeks, with the prosecution calling witnesses to testify about the events of 27 March 2018 and the systems in place at the Higgins Homes development. Each of the four men and the company maintain their denials. The jury will ultimately decide whether the death of Michaela Boor was the result of criminal negligence or an unavoidable tragedy, a determination that will carry profound consequences for all those involved and, potentially, for safety practices across the construction industry.