Death destroys a devoted Dad

For Gavin Vanner it was love at first sight.

Cradling his newly delivered daughter at the maternity wing of New Plymouth Hospital he had everything he wished for.

Yesterday, nearly 5 years later, tears ran down his face in the High Court at New Plymouth.

Molly, the little girl he wanted so badly, is dead and he is charged with her manslaughter.

The Crown says he was grossly negligent on August 30 last year when on the family's Taranaki farm he let her ride his quad bike, which rolled, killing her instantly.

As nearly 40 farmers filled the public gallery of the court his wife Wendy held back tears while saying how much Vanner loved his daughter. The man she knew now was different and one day she hoped she'd have her husband back.

She has hardly been to the cowshed since Molly's accident - he does not want her or their two other daughters, Eva and Hillary, down there.

He goes down the farm alone.

"I just think he doesn't trust himself to do those things any more. He's punishing himself."

Her eyes are red-ringed beneath sculptured brown hair as she glances from her husband, sitting between two prison officers, to his lawyer, Susan Hughes.

The couple both came from farming families, they wanted the same lifestyle for their family and farm bikes were all part of it, she told the court.

"I didn't see any reason we shouldn't bring our children up in the same way Gavin and I were probably brought up. We were around them every day."

When she was 15 they met through surf lifesaving and fell in love.

The local search and rescue boat was stored on their farm and Vanner helped in searches down the coast, she said.

Friends described his relationship with children, saying that while he was a surf lifesaver he was like the "pied piper". Children followed him everywhere and the couple organised local discos for children in conjunction with the police.

They married in 2000 after seven years of living together and slogged hard. She worked two jobs and he ran the farm they leased until they could buy it in 2000.

"To see what Gavin is like now compared to what he was like before Molly's accident, I just hope I get my husband back."

All her husband ever wanted was a little girl, she said.

Her pregnancy with Molly was a difficult one and everything that could go wrong did, she said.

"Gavin was the first person to hold her when she was born."

She went to have a shower and talk to the midwife and left him sitting in a reclining chair talking to his baby.

"He was reluctant I think to give her up [when she came back] he was just so happy that he had his little girl. Love at first sight.

"I remember when Molly got her first sore tummy he was the one that rocked her to sleep, not me."

As she grew Molly's favourite things were lunch in town with her father and a fluffy (a frothy treat) or taking picnics to him at the back of the farm.

"Every morning [before milking] he tucked the girls in. Sometimes she'd wake up and she'd look up at him and say 'I love you, Dad'."

Under cross-examination by Crown prosecutor Cherie Clarke, Mrs Vanner said she had never seen pamphlets about [all terrain vehicle] safety.

When asked if she had ever seen an instruction manual for the bike she replied that it was like a washing machine or dishwasher - if you already had one you knew how to use it.

On farms, she said, children were part of the "team" - they were there helping their parents because they wanted to, "sponges" absorbing everything around them, she said.

Her daughter was responsible beyond her years, confident and capable, and her husband loved her.

"I hate the thought that the other two girls are missing out on the lifestyle I sought for my children."

He told her in the days following the accident he was sorry.

"He kept blaming himself, kept telling me that he was so sorry, he wanted that if he could change places with Molly.

"We've planted a tree where Molly's accident was and he spends a lot of time in that paddock ... I can tell what he's been doing when he comes home just the general look on his face."

Molly had ridden as a passenger on farm bikes since she was old enough to go in the back pack. She used to cry when she could not go on the farm with him.

"She loved her dad so much they were very, very close."

As other farmers filed through the court yesterday to give evidence the story was the same - all their children rode on farm bikes.