A Coroner yesterday made a final plea for help to trace a hit and run driver involved in an horrific fatal accident.

Slovakian national Imrich Kiss, 52, was struck by a vehicle and hurled through the air into the path of an oncoming car, an inquest heard.

Motorist Neil Dunne braked and swerved but had no chance of avoiding running over the pedestrian.

Mr Kiss, a 52-year-old divorced builder, was trapped under the Rover Cabriolet and died at the scene from multiple injuries.

The tragedy happened in Thornton Road, Girlington, near to the junction with Hockney Road, on the evening of March 5 this year.

The vehicle which struck Mr Kiss, who had drunk the equivalent of four pints of beer, has never been traced.

Mr Dunne, a mechanic, had been driving home with his six-month-old child strapped to a baby seat in the front and his fiancee in the back.

He told the inquest he saw the pedestrian being struck by the vehicle and propelled into the air and thought he was going to come through his windscreen. He made an emergency stop and swerved to the left but could not avoid running over the man.

PC Martin Ward, a collision investigator with West Yorkshire Police, said Mr Kiss had been diagonally crossing the road to the left of a pelican crossing, but not on it, when he was struck by the first vehicle in the centre of the carriageway. He said Mr Dunne’s Rover was roadworthy and was being driven within the speed limit. Mr Dunne gave a negative breath test.

Coroner Roger Whittaker, recording an accidental death verdict, said the impact with the first vehicle propelled Mr Kiss into the air and he landed in front of the Rover.

He said Mr Dunne had “no opportunity of evading contact with him, nor stopping before he inevitably ran over Mr Kiss.”

Mr Whittaker told him: “You have no need to reproach yourself. You are in no way to blame.”

Mr Whittaker said that what happened leading up to or as a result of the first impact might never be resolved. He said great steps had been taken to trace the vehicle but it had not been possible, despite the best efforts of police.

The coroner added: “If anyone knows anything of that incident and the first impact, they should immediately get in touch with police.”

After the case PC Shane Kenny, of Bradford South Roads Policing, who was in charge of the investigation, urged anyone who had any information about the first vehicle to contact him on 0845 6060606.