Obliged to settle the score
Both Kyle Hayes and John Kiely are keen to close the page on the player’s violent disorder conviction
At six minutes past eleven on Wednesday morning, the judge looked down from his lofty perch at the man sitting alone in the witness box below. “Kyle Hayes, stand up please.” Judge Dermot Sheehan’s tone was polite but brisk. The holder of five senior All-Ireland medals stood immediately and clasped his hands in front of him. He would stand there for 29 minutes before he’d hear the verdict that would make or break his world.
For the first 27 minutes, Sheehan narrated from his notes the facts, circumstances and contested evidence of a case that was now about to reach its climax, four years and five months after the violence that had set the dominoes falling. “Eighteen months in prison” on one count of violent disorder and “two years in prison” on the second count of violent disorder. The jail terms would be concurrent.
Two minutes later came the magic words that would preserve Hayes’s life as he had known it: “Both sentences are to be suspended.” Finally, his giant frame, wrapped in a navy coat, released its pent-up tension. And 36 minutes after he stood to hear his fate, he sat back down. For 29 minutes, he had stood at a crossroads, one road leading to prison, the other leading back to the world he’d known and the life he’d lived as one of the greatest hurlers of his generation.
It must have been the loneliest half hour of his life, made all the more so by the apparent absence of friends or family in the courtroom.
At noon, Hayes, his mobile phone glued to his ear, strode down the hallway that leads to the front entrance of the courts complex on Mulgrave Street in Limerick city. The phone was evidently not for show. He was co-ordinating his exit with an associate because just as he walked the final ten yards, a silver Audi pulled up outside the front doors. Hayes came through the doors, through the media scrum on the footpath outside and into the passenger seat of the car.
With that, he was gone. Wednesday, March 20, was the first day of the rest of his life. The page had been turned. Kyle Hayes was a free man.
Cillian McCarthy, on the other
hand, was surrounded by loved ones as he stood outside the courtroom afterwards, listening to a final debrief from the barrister who had prosecuted the case on behalf of the State.
McCarthy, from Ballysimon, no longer carries the visible wounds of the ordeal he suffered on the night of October 28, 2019. Presumably, the conclusion of the case last Wednesday represented the start of a new chapter for him, too. Some measure of justice had been served for having his face smashed and his head punched in a Limerick night club, and for having his head kicked and his body kicked by various assailants as he lay in the foetal position outside the venue.
The trial ran for two weeks at Limerick Circuit Criminal Court last November. Hayes was charged with assault causing harm to Cillian McCarthy, and with two counts of violent disorder. He denied all charges.
McCarthy, a carpenter, gave evidence at the trial. He said he had consumed a bottle of rum with a friend on the evening in question before repairing to the Icon night club. There they met school friends of McCarthy, two young women, and they were having a chat when Hayes came over and warned him to “stay the f **k away” from the girls. Hayes was apparently of the view that one of the young women was dating a friend of his; he took umbrage at seeing her socialise with another man. McCarthy said he tried to explain to Hayes that she was just an old school pal. “But he didn’t want to hear it.” Hayes became “aggressive” and then uttered the line: “Do you know who the f **k I am?”
McCarthy backed off and walked away, sensing the situation would escalate. But later on he met the two women again on the dance floor, at which point Hayes came over again. He “charged” towards McCarthy. “He told me he was getting sick of me. He told me if I wanted ‘to do it’, we’d ‘do it’. Suddenly, a friend of Hayes “threw the first punch, hitting me in my right eye.” Then Hayes and the friend started “punching me continuously into the head.” He received further blows when other men joined the brawl.
CCTV footage of the fracas was played to the jury.
“You can clearly see Kyle Hayes jumping in and punching me,” stated McCarthy.
Eventually, the club’s bouncers arrived on the scene. A number of men were ejected from the premises.
“My right eye was pounding,” said the witness. “I could feel blood dripping down my face. It was getting hard to see out through it as it was swelling up a lot.”
On the street outside, he said, Hayes caught up with him and threatened him again, saying he’d “dig the head off me.”
McCarthy’s friend was then surrounded by Hayes and some of Hayes’s mates. McCarthy went to the rescue of his friend and “it all kicked off again.” Hayes and others started “throwing punches left, right and centre, trying to attack us.” He and his friend tried to run away but were chased down. McCarthy was knocked to the ground. “That’s when they started stamping on me.” Five or six males, including Kyle Hayes,
Kyle Hayes was handed a suspended sentence.
“were standing over me ... Between punches and kicks [I received] roughly about 20 continuous blows.”
McCarthy’s friend was also kicked and beaten on the ground.
Cillian McCarthy
A number of gardaí arrived on the scene. Detective Garda Dean Landers told the court that he saw two men on the ground.
One had blood on his face, the other was surrounded by a group of men, including Hayes, who were “punching and kicking [him] while he lay on the ground.” The man was screaming at them to stop. Landers said Hayes stood out from the other assailants because he was conspicuously taller than them.
“He was swinging kicks directly into the male, all over his body. The male was curled up into the ground while receiving kicks.”
Det Gda Landers grabbed Hayes and pulled him off the victim. Hayes “told me to f **k off and pulled his arm at force away from my grip and turned and ran.” The policeman gave chase and eventually caught up with him and arrested him. Hayes was taken to Henry Street Garda Station and processed through the custody suite at 1.38am before finally being released without charge.
Garda Daniel O’Riordan had arrived on the scene with Landers. Both were cross-examined by Hayes’s barrister, Brian McInerney, who raised the possibility of misidentification on their part. The defendant’s brother, Cian Hayes, was also over six feet tall. It was Cian Hayes, McInerney suggested, who had come “under attack”, and Kyle Hayes “went to his brother’s assistance.”
Neither garda had seen the pre
vious incident inside the night club, nor had they seen who had struck the first blow. They agreed that the street was crowded with people and that there was general “chaos”.
Asked by counsel if he was possibly confused as to the identity of the assailants, Garda O’Riordan replied: “I’m not confused by what I saw. I saw Kyle Hayes; he was most identifiable.” O’Riordan previously told prosecution counsel that he had “absolutely no doubt” that Kyle Hayes was one of them. “I observed him draw back and kick a man who was lying on the ground, kicking forward into the man’s head and shoulder area twice.”
On December 1 the jury returned with its decisions. Kyle Hayes was found not guilty of the charge of assault causing harm to McCarthy. (He wasn’t charged in connection with the assault on the friend of McCarthy.)
The jury found him guilty on each of the two counts of violent disorder. Judge Sheehan remanded Hayes on bail for sentencing until January 19.
He warned the guilty party that he “can expect a custodial sentence.”
At the January 19 hearing, testimonials on behalf of the defendant were furnished by his employers, former mentors at university and charity activists, all of whom commended his work ethic and character.
But it was the support offered by John Kiely that generated fresh headlines. Kiely, as senior team manager, has been the chief architect of Limerick hurling’s golden age. On the field, Hayes has been one of the team’s foundational pillars. It goes without saying, therefore, that Kiely would have felt some duty of pastoral care to a player who had served him so well but was now in serious trouble. So Kiely entered the witness box to help in the pleas for mitigation.
He had viewed the incriminating CCTV footage and conceded that he’d found Hayes’s behaviour on the night “very disappointing”. On the other hand, the publicity and media coverage had been “extremely difficult” for Hayes; the player had paid “a heavy price”; everyone deserved a second chance; and Hayes had “accepted responsibility” for his actions.
John O’Sullivan, the prosecuting
barrister, picked Kiely up on the latter point. If Hayes had accepted responsibility, then why had he not pled guilty in the first place?
Judge Sheehan also challenged Kiely on parts of his testimony. He asked the manager how many hours his players spend in training each week. “About 30,” Kiely replied. Sheehan wondered if all this time spent inside this bubble had not left Hayes “sheltered from the realities of life.” Might this be an example of a person “who, for all his achievements, had limited socialisation.”
McCarthy read out a victim impact statement at the January 19 hearing. The beating he took in the small hours of October 28, 2019, had a profound impact on him and his family. He’d been in a constant state of anxiety since. His self-confidence had been undermined. His working life had been affected. He had been abused and slandered on social media. He’d needed specialist facial surgery. He still suffered from severe headaches and blurred vision as a result of the damage done to his eye socket.
Judge Sheehan adjourned sentencing until March 20. And on Wednesday morning last, having weighed everything up, he decided that “it would not be appropriate to impose an immediate custodial sentence ... The accused appears to have improved himself in the meantime and society would not benefit were I to impose an immediate custodial sentence on Kyle Hayes.”
On Thursday, John Kiely professed himself relieved that the case was finally over. He said he’d appeared as a character witness in court because “I wanted to show him that I was there to support him but also that it doesn’t mean I’m condoning what happened at all — quite the contrary.” In reply to further questioning, he added: “Listen, it’s over, it has been dealt with by the courts, we move on.”
Hayes, he clarified, would not be involved in yesterday evening’s national league semi-final against Kilkenny because “he has a bit of an ankle injury.” He should, however, be back in time to begin Limerick’s bid for a historic fifth All-Ireland title in a row.
Time will tell whether this was a seminal moment in this year’s hurling season. But at the final whistle in Páirc Uí Chaoimh it certainly felt the game’s tectonic plates had shifted after Kilkenny had sensationally upset the odds and hammered All-Ireland champions Limerick.
It was the first time John Kielty’s side lost a knockout game since the Cats beat them in the 2019 All-Ireland semi-final. Since then Limerick had beaten the Cats in back-to-back All-Ireland finals as well as last year’s league final by a combined tally of 22 points. But Derek Lyng’s emerging side pulled off their most important win yet when ending Limerick’s resign as league champions in sensational fashion.
Three first-half goals and a manof-the-match performance from TJ Reid — who scored 1-8 — were key factors for Kilkenny, who won despite having Eoin Cody sent off early in the second half.
It might only be the league but everybody will sit up and take notice — most of all Limerick’s rivals in the Munster championship which begins in five weeks’ time. Limerick could be without Peter Casey for their first-round tie against Clare after he was red-carded.
Eighteen of the players who
featured in last July’s All-Ireland final — nine from each side — started this tie. Kilkenny had the advantage of a very strong breeze, so much so that Eoin Murphy could land his puckouts inside the opponents’ 20m line. But Limerick secured possession from three of Murphy’s first four puckouts which contributed to them making a blistering start. They were 1-2 to 0-0 ahead after five minutes with Aaron Gillane grabbing the goal after Cillian Buckley failed to clear his lines.
Eoin Cody, operating in isolation on the edge of the square, was central to Kilkenny’s revival which was achieved in a sensational three-minute spell. After Reid opened their account with a routine free, Cody rounded Declan Nash having controlling a long delivery from Jordan Molloy and beat Nickie Quaid with a blistering shot.
Soon afterwards Alan Costelloe found himself isolated against Cody and though Quaid brilliantly parried his shot, Luke Hogan was ideally placed to drive the rebound to the net. Kilkenny were full of energy and the work-rate of their forwards meant that Limerick were unable to build from the back.
The Cats’ ambition was underlined when Reid went for goal from a 13m free which Alan Costello saved and from the clearance, Gillane became the first Limerick forward to score a point from play in the 18th minute.
Cian Lynch was far less influential than normal but it was Kilkenny’s
He told me he was getting sick of me. He told me if I wanted ‘to do it’, we’d ‘do it’.