Keith Barry's near-brush with death after a horrific car crash was the catalyst for his decision to become a dad.

The A-listers' favourite magician revealed to the Diary how almost losing his life in an accident in March 2007 was the impetus he needed to jump into fatherhood.

"After the accident, I got to thinking, what would I have done differently? And the only thing I would have changed in my life was to have a baby and here we are, a year later and my wife Mairead is due in August or September," he explained.

"I'm absolutely delighted and very excited to become a dad. The leg might not be the same after the accident, but everything else is working just fine!"

And the illusionist has also used his powers to determine the sex of his offspring.

"I have a good hunch. I didn't find out from the hospital or anything but I have a good idea what it is -- I'm keeping it to myself though," he continued.

The celebrity magician, who has worked his powers on everyone from Colin Farrell to Nadine Coyle, is lucky to be alive after last year's crash and had to endure months of intense physiotherapy in order to walk again.

However, he expressed his disappointment after his official complaint to the Police Ombudsman about how the car accident was handled was rejected by the authority.

It's understood that the driver of the other car, which cut across the road and ploughed into Barry's Subaru Voyager while he was driving back from Jim Aiken's funeral in Newry, was an off-duty policeman based in the North.

At the time, Keith was told that the driver's injuries were too serious for him to be tested for drink driving. A file on the accident was sent to the DPP -- but the man was only sent on a one-week driver's improvement course.

"I wasn't too happy about that at all so I lodged an official complaint but they came back and said they could find no evidence of any wrong-doing so that was it, you just have to move on," he continued.

Physiotherapy

"Having said that, I had to be cut out of the car and the injuries to my leg were as bad as you can possibly get. I was told I was five minutes away from having it amputated. I'm still doing a huge amount of physiotherapy with Sports Med Ireland and if it wasn't for them, I'd still be on crutches. I have to go to the gym twice a week and I see a personal physiotherapist three times so its probably as good as it's going to get."

And after taking an eight-month break from showbiz to recover from his injuries, Barry is now back with a bang. As well as embarking on a nationwide tour this month, he's heading to the bright lights of Las Vegas this year.

In the meantime, he'll be trying to wow Irish audiences with his mental abilities -- and may also be dishing out €10,000 cash to one lucky participant.

"The cash will be on stage in a box and the idea is that out of five keys, only one of them opens the box," he said.

"I've got to influence them away from the one key that actually opens the box. I've got to keep myself good and sharp so I can hang on to my money."

- MF