3 years after son's death, mom says little done to address dangers of unmarked barriers

A mother says she's still waiting for the provincial government to accept responsibility for the part she claims it played in the tragic accident that killed her son three years ago.

Stephen Brown, 15, died instantly when he drove his dirt bike into an unmarked chain strung across a public access road just outside Lethbridge. The accident happened in October 2012.

• Teen killed as dirt bike strikes metal chain

The chain had been placed there by Stephen Brown's own grand-uncle, Terry Brown, to keep people away from a scrapyard he was operating.

The teenager's mother, Michelle Brown, maintains the accident would never have happened had provincial regulations regarding road barriers and scrap yards been enforced.

"We have rules and regulations for everything in Newfoundland and Labrador," she told CBC. "But the challenge is, they're not being enforced. It was Stephen. It could have been someone else." 

Brown says she's been let down by everybody.

No charges related to death

The RCMP investigated at the time but never laid any charges.

Repeated attempts to have government admit that it failed to protect her son and the public at large have gotten her nowhere.

She says the best explanation she's received so far is in a letter by Municipal and Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Keith Hutchings.

That letter states that government officials checked out the accident scene some time after the tragedy, but the barrier had been removed by then and there were no grounds for laying charges.

The letter also says the scrap yard needed no government approval.

Michelle Brown claims the yard was in violation of environmental standards, and she has photographs to back up her claim. 

According to a spokesperson for the Department of Environment, the department has no record of any violations.

The yard has since been cleaned up. Any traces of it have been removed.

Brown says that's simply not good enough.

"I could have just faded away and grieve for the rest of my life, and I will. But what kind of a mother would I be if I sat back and allowed this to continue, and if somebody else was hurt, and I would have said nothing to prevent it?"

Mother hoped for 'Stephen's Law' 

Early on, Brown envisaged the government adopting a stricter set of rules for unmarked barriers like the one that killed her son. She dreamed of calling that Stephen's Law.

• Mom pleads for law on road barriers after son's death

She says she was assured more than two years ago that the government was going to conduct a review of how other jurisdictions deal with barriers across roadways, both public and private. 

But that was the last she heard of it.

In a letter to Brown's lawyer earlier this year, Hutchings wrote that the province will "continue to address and take action on such structures across rights-of-way on Crown lands as they are encountered." 

The government has offered to sit down with Brown to discuss her concerns.

Brown says an admission that the government fell down on the job of enforcing its own regulations must come first.