A garbage truck driver who ran over an emaciated homeless man sleeping in a Sydney laneway after mistaking him for a pile of blankets has been cleared of negligent driving causing death.

Ian Juurik, 36, had denied the charge in Downing Centre Local Court after the incident on Bourke Lane in Redfern during the morning bin run on May 21 last year.

Mathew Hayne, who was 1.58 metres tall and weighed 53 kilograms, had wrapped himself in a thin foam mattress on the street, which has 45-centimetre-wide sloping footpaths on each side.

The 31-year-old, who was described by a responding paramedic as "very, very emaciated", suffered fractures from his left ribs to his right pelvis. He died at the scene.