The High Court has quashed Kevin Taylor's assault conviction arising from events during the execution of a possession order at Falsk, Strokestown, County Roscommon, in December 2018.
Taylor had initially been convicted in the District Court in July 2022 of assaulting security worker Ian Gordon. The District Court did not accept Gordon's specific allegation that Taylor had grabbed him by the genitals, but found that Taylor had nevertheless unlawfully laid hands on him and imposed a €200 fine.
Taylor appealed by way of a full rehearing to the Circuit Court. Gordon again alleged that Taylor grabbed him by the genitals and brought him to the ground. Taylor disputed that account and argued that he had intervened to protect Robert Brady, whom he described as a vulnerable person being pushed or attacked by security personnel.
The Circuit Court convicted Taylor in March 2024 and imposed two months' imprisonment after reducing a three-month headline sentence. Taylor subsequently served that sentence.
In judicial review proceedings, Mr Justice Garrett Simons rejected Taylor's arguments that the District Court had partly acquitted him and that the assault charge lacked sufficient specificity. The court held that there had been one charge of simple assault and that a Circuit Court appeal is a complete rehearing in which earlier factual findings do not bind the appeal court.
However, Taylor succeeded on two other grounds. The High Court found that the Circuit Court judge took over part of Taylor's cross-examination of Gordon, reducing the effectiveness of planned questions about alleged inconsistencies, video evidence and missing bodycam footage. That materially impaired Taylor's opportunity to challenge the main prosecution witness.
The court also held that the Circuit Court applied the wrong test to Taylor's defence under section 18 of the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act 1997. The judge should have considered the circumstances as Taylor honestly believed them to be, rather than asking only whether a criminal act objectively occurred.
The conviction will therefore be set aside. The High Court's provisional view was that the case should not be sent back for another hearing because Taylor has served his sentence and more than seven years have passed since the incident.