Queen’s Olympic stunt double guilty of ‘nasty’ attack on girlfriend
THE Queen’s skydiving stunt double at the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics faces jail for attacking his girlfriend in a “nasty” case of domestic violence.
Gary Connery, 53, who leapt out of a plane dressed as the monarch in the Bond stunt, was convicted of causing grievous bodily harm without intent by throwing his partner down a flight of stairs, The Mail on Sunday reported.
Jurors who cleared him of GBH with intent heard how he smashed Tanya Brass’s head on to a bannister on October 24 2020, before pushing her down the stairs.
Prosecutor Jonathan Stone called the assault a “nasty allegation of domestic violence”, at Reading Crown Court, adding that none of the character witnesses who spoke of him in “glowing terms” saw he and Ms Brass “home alone, when he holds all the cards”.
Connery claimed Ms Brass had tripped while trying to hit him on the staircase at their home in Henley-onthames in Oxfordshire.
He later admitted to the police that he had said “instant karma” when his victim, who took prescribed medication for bipolar personality disorder, landed at the bottom of the stairs.
Ms Brass said that Connery took her phone when she tried to call an ambulance and told medics he had pushed her at the scene, the court heard.
In the opening ceremony, the Queen embarked on a secret mission with James Bond, played by Daniel Craig, in a spoof which was beamed across the world 10 years ago on Wednesday.
Connery was dressed in a salmon dress identical to the one worn by the monarch during the event as he jumped from 800ft above the stadium, deploying his parachute at 500ft, with the real Queen entering the arena shortly after.
Nicknamed the Birdman of Henley after jumping out of an aeroplane without a parachute and landing on a pile of cardboard boxes, he spent months training in secret for the jump, landing on a nearby bridge.
The ceremony, which formally opened the Games at the Olympic stadium in east London, was called a “masterpiece” and “a love letter to Britain”.
A worldwide television audience of about 900 million watched as the spoof film showed Daniel Craig as James Bond entering the front gate of Buckingham Palace in a London black cab.
The Queen, playing herself, acknowledged the famous fictional spy with the words, “Good evening, Mr Bond.’’
Connery will be sentenced at a later date.