Brawl over bingo cash allegations
Committee man is sent sprawling through toilet door
A well-known former official at Fallin Miners’ Welfare sent a committee man sprawling through the ladies’ toilet door after allegedly being accused of drinking the bingo money.
Trouble flared when Alexander Reynolds, 63, lashed out at Dickie Maxwell, 58, during a badtempered dominoes night on September 29 last year.
According to Mr Maxwell, Mr Reynolds swung a punch at him, catching him above the left eyebrow, as he came out of the gents. Mr Reynolds said it was Mr Maxwell who threw the punch and he had simply pushed him away in self-defence.
Either way, Mr Maxwell went flying through the half-open door of the ladies’ loo next door, crashing to the floor with his head hitting the ground. He was left bleeding profusely from a cut above the left eyebrow which doctors had to use five stitches to close.
At Stirling Sheriff Court last week jurors took less than 15 minutes to find a charge of assault against Mr Reynolds not proven.
The court heard that Mr Reynolds, a retired Stirling Council lorry driver who had never been in trouble in his life before, and Mr Maxwell, a security guard, had both grown up in Fallin and had known each other all their lives.
Mr Maxwell, an unpaid member of the Miners’ Welfare management committee, said that, on the night of the incident, he was at the club watching a dominoes competition when Mr Reynolds walked in.
He told the jury: “We started speaking about who got paid and who didn’t get paid. I said that when Mr Reynolds was on the committee he got paid for it, and now we don’t.”
Mr Maxwell admitted that both he and Mr Reynolds, who had last served on the committee in the 1990s, were “probably as bad as each other” and voices were raised.
Mr Reynolds said Mr Maxwell had alleged that, during his tenure in office, he had used part of the bingo proceeds to buy beer for himself. In court, Mr Maxwell denied saying any such thing.
He then allegedly challenged Mr Maxwell to go outside for a fight – an invitation Mr Maxwell said he ignored and Mr Reynolds left.
However, when he went to the toilet at the end of the evening he claimed to find Mr Reynolds waiting for him. He said: “When I came out I noticed the light was out in the foyer. He punched me and I fell, partly into the doorway of the ladies toilets.”
The blow smashed his glasses and would leave him with a scar. As he walked home he decided to call the police.
Reynolds denied assaulting Mr Maxwell to his severe injury and permanent disfigurement. He told his solicitor, Brian Allison, he had simply been waiting in the foyer “to get it sorted out”.
He said: “I just wanted to have a friendly discussion with Dickie Maxwell, to say ‘dinnae accuse me of something I haven’t done’.
“He’d said that when I was on the bingo I was taking money from the bingo and using it for my beer money. I wasn’t very pleased about that, and he’d just kept going on about it.
“I’d been getting a bit wound up with his allegations and somebody had said ‘Dickie you’re going a bit too far’. But as soon as he saw me he lashed out.”
He said he simply “shoved” Mr Maxwell away. “As soon as I shoved him, he fell into the ladies’ toilets,” he added.
Both men said they had consumed six pints of lager, but neither was drunk.
He punched me and I fell, partly into the doorway of the ladies toilets