Manaccusedofthreatening torapegarda’swifeandkids
AUGHRIM MAN DUE BACK BEFORE COURT OVER INCIDENT ON HIS WEDDING ANNIVERSARY
A MAN who threatened to rape the wife and children of a Wicklow town garda and is accused of spitting at him while in custody will appear before Arklow District Court today for judgement.
Jason Byrne, 29 Riverfield, Aughrim, pleaded guilty to intoxication in public and threatening, abusive and insulting behaviour at Sea Road, Arklow, on June 4, 2015 but contested a charge of assault against Garda Niall Kennedy of Wicklow Garda Station at Arklow Garda Station on the same date.
Byrne’s wife Jennifer O’Leary, of the same address, pleaded guilty to threatening, abusive and insulting behaviour and failure to comply with the direction of a Garda at the Arklow Bay Hotel on June 4, 2015.
Garda Niall Kennedy told the court that on the date in question, a call was received at Arklow Garda Station about an alleged assault on a night porter at the Arklow Bay Hotel and when he arrived at the scene he saw that there had been an altercation between the night porter and a patron.
‘It was the couple’s wedding anniversary and Mr Byrne continually abused the night porter and said that we [the Gardaí] were working with that Polish c***,’ said Garda Kennedy.
The garda said that the porter wanted the man removed from the premises.
He said that the defendant left the hotel but was upset and very irate and felt that the gardaí were ‘working for the hotel’.
The court heard that the verbal abuse continued and when Garda Kennedy asked Byrne to leave the area, he did so, going out onto Sea Road where he apologised for his behaviour but then took off his top and began the abuse again, calling gardaí ‘pigs’ and ‘rats’.
Byrne was then arrested under Section 4 and 6 of the Public Order Act and the court heard that he was very aggressive while handcuffed but then calmed down again and apologised to the gardaí.
Garda Kennedy said that when he was putting Byrne into the back of the car, Byrne ‘made a lunge to hit me a head butt’ and was then restrained at arm’s length.
Garda Fiona Furlong, who was also at the scene and driving the patrol car, told the court that in the rear-view mirror she saw the lunge but it did not connect and so she continued en route to Arklow Garda Station.
The court heard that when Byrne was taken out of the car at Arklow Garda Station he became remorseful and started to cry but once he was brought inside ‘went mad again abusing the Gardaí’.
‘We didn’t get to fill out the custody record as the prisoner was very aggressive and we had to remove his trousers for a search and to be placed in the cell. He had knowledge of my name,’ said Garda Kennedy.
‘He said he would rape my wife and my children and he abused Garda Furlong,’ the garda added.
The court heard that Byrne later asked for a doctor to attend but, when the doctor arrived, Byrne refused to see him as he was ‘foreign’ and said that would ‘shoot him and dance in his blood’.
‘He was so hostile and violent that the doctor left the station,’ said Garda Kennedy.
Garda Kennedy said that later again, during a check on the prisoner, officers noticed that he had his head covered with the cell blanket and that it was removed for his safety.
‘ The abuse continued and he said he would find out where I lived. He called me a Wexford p***k and said he would rape and kill my family.’
Garda Kennedy said that when the accused asked for a drink of water, he brought it to the cell, opened the hatch and looked in at which point the defendant spat at him.
‘As I opened the hatch, he spat into my face, down my cheek and into my mouth,’ the garda said.
He said that this was the first time he had been assaulted in 12 years as a garda.
In cross-examination, defence solicitor Damien Sheridan put it to Garda Kennedy that his client’s behaviour was ‘ the culmination of many things building up over the night’.
He argued that the removal of the defendant’s trousers and, later, the blanket were done for vindictive reasons.
Garda Kennedy replied that these items were both removed for Byrne’s safety.
Mr Sheridan produced photographs in court which were taken two days after the incident, suggesting that the redness and bruising and a cut on his client’s head were caused during custody and ‘ to put manners on him’.
He probed Garda Kennedy about his boxing career and asked if he had ever given anybody a kidney punch.
Garda Kennedy said that if he did, it would do more damage than seen in the photos.
‘It’s not my job to put manners on anybody,’ said Garda Kennedy.
Garda Fiona Furlong said that she was dealing with Jennifer O’Leary when the officers first attended the Arklow Bay Hotel.
She said that O’Leary refused to leave the area but then did so. She was later arrested when she returned to the hotel.
Garda Furlong said that Byrne called her a ‘ dirty lesbian whore’ while in custody and said he would rape her. She said she saw Garda Kennedy going to hand the water through the hatch to Byrne.
The Member in Charge on the night in question, Garda Conor Duhy, was called to give evidence from the custody record.
He said that when Byrne became violent and aggressive, he was taken to the cells and ‘was bucking and difficult to deal with’.
Garda Duhy said that gardaí searched Byrne’s pants and took his belt off and that Byrne then became irate and threw the trousers at them. He said that the blanket was removed as the defendant was coughing and there was concern that it was restricting his breathing.
‘ The prisoner was punching and kicking the door and abusing Garda Kennedy. This continued for hours. He threatened to rip his throat out, called him a long b*****d, threatened to rape his wife, children and mother and called him a little bitch. He said he was going to shoot all Garda Kennedy’s family and wished them to die with cancer,’ Garda Duhy said.
The court was told that the abuse continued for some hours and that during this time, Byrne also called his wife in the adjacent cell a rat and a ‘dirty O’Leary freak’ and said ‘Happy anniversary baby.’
He later stripped off his clothes and the court heard that he rubbed blood all over the cell area.
The gardaí said that the blood could have come from Byrne’s knuckles when he was boxing the cell door but Byrne claimed it was from a head injury caused by gardaí. He admitted that he fell backwards onto the floor during the earlier altercation at the hotel but denied hitting his head there.
Sergeant Mairead Brophy told the court that she was appointed to investigate the alleged assault on Garda Kennedy and that at no time was any complaint made by Byrne or O’Leary in relation to any other incident outside of this, either at the hotel or garda station.
In evidence, Byrne said he wished to ‘apologise profoundly’ for his verbal abuse of the gardaí and said that ‘alcohol was involved’.
However, he denied the assault charge and said that he did not spit at Garda Kennedy but refused the water, saying it was lukewarm.
Byrne told the court that Garda Kennedy threw the water in the hatch at him.
He said that he was the victim and that he had been assaulted at the hotel and that his wife had called to report this to the gardaí. Byrne said that an altercation had occurred when the night porter refused to give him a free bottle of champagne which he claimed was part of a complimentary night included in their wedding package a year before.
Byrne claimed that while in custody he was punched and slapped and that his foot was stood on.
He also told the court that he had been dealing with a mental health issue for a number of years and that this was to blame for his mood going up and down. He gave evidence that he ‘drank a good drop’ on the night in question and was also on anti-depressants and medication for a neck injury.
In cross-examination, Inspector Ronan Lalor put it to Byrne that his account was ‘completely incredulous’ and that he believed that he was the victim.
‘Your evidence was that you were very drunk and you admitted in direct evidence to being abusive. Do you believe that people carrying out their work should be subjected to that verbal abuse?’ he asked.
‘I’m not a professional though. The gardaí are wearing the uniform and are supposed to be professional at all times,’ Byrne replied.
Byrne denied knowing that Garda Kennedy was from Wexford and said that he did not know his place of residence as Garda Byrne is stationed in Wicklow town.
Jennifer O’Leary said that it was a first wedding anniversary that she will ‘never forget’.
She said from her cell, she heard her husband calling for a glass of water and heard the gardaí talking about it before she heard Garda Kennedy shouting ‘assault, assault’.
‘Jason shouted he had been hit,’ O’Leary said.
O’Leary said that she would not lie for her husband and did not defend the verbal abuse but said she believes Byrne when he said he did not spit at Garda Kennedy. ‘I believe him the same way as you believe your staff,’ she told Inspector Lalor.
Mr Sheridan submitted to the court that there was a ‘significant variance’ between Garda Kennedy and Garda Duhy’s evidence regarding the removal of Byrne’s trousers, which creates an element of doubt.
Judge Bernadette Owens said that she would take a week to review the evidence and give it some consideration before making a decision today ( Wednesday, January 17).