The High Court has dismissed a woman’s claim that Gardaí assaulted her during an armed search of her home in Dunleer, Co Louth, in July 2010. Mr Justice Barr found she had not proved, on the balance of probabilities, that she was assaulted or that her physical or psychiatric injuries were caused by wrongdoing during the search.
The plaintiff said nine armed male Gardaí entered her home in the early hours of 10 July 2010. She alleged that a Garda kicked her as she was taken down a hallway, restrained her on a sofa, and later threw her onto a bed, tearing her pyjama bottoms. She also claimed the search led to bruising, post-traumatic stress disorder and depression. The Garda defendants denied assaulting her and denied causing her injuries.
The plaintiff’s account was supported in part by a GP’s record of a fading bruise on her inner right thigh and by her sister, who said she saw a bruise that morning. The judge was not satisfied that Gardaí caused it. He considered it more likely that the bruise resulted from an incident in June 2010 in which a cow struck the plaintiff in the abdomen or pelvic area. He also found inconsistencies in the accounts given by the plaintiff and her sister.
The judge accepted the Garda witnesses’ evidence about the search. He found the plaintiff knew throughout that the search was being carried out by Gardaí, noting evidence that officers wore Garda clothing, announced themselves as armed Gardaí, and that Detective Sergeant Malone showed her a warrant and identification. He preferred the Garda witnesses’ accounts of what happened in the hallway and spare room and rejected the allegations of assault there. He also accepted evidence that Malone, rather than Detective Garda Casey, took the plaintiff from the spare room to the living room.
The judgment records that the search followed arrests earlier that night, after explosives and ammunition were found in a car driven by the plaintiff’s boyfriend. The judge said the nighttime search by armed officers, and what the plaintiff learned about her boyfriend, may have had a traumatic effect and may have contributed to her psychiatric difficulties. But he found she had not established that her physical or psychiatric injuries were caused by wrongdoing by Gardaí during the search.
The court dismissed the plaintiff’s case against the Commissioner of An Garda Síochána, the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, and the Attorney General. The judgment does not award damages to the plaintiff.