Garda says she 'didn't feel right' making 'false' record of supervisor's alleged assault of suspect
The case was heard at Waterford District Court on Friday.
A COURT HAS heard details of a dispute between gardaí over claims that a Garda Sergeant pressured a junior colleague to make a “false” entry on Waterford Garda Station’s custody register, following an alleged altercation involving the sergeant and a criminal suspect.
The younger, junior garda told Waterford District Court yesterday that it “didn’t feel right” when she allegedly neglected to record the incident involving the senior officer, who was also her supervisor at the time.
Garda Rachel Pratt alleged that Sgt William Doyle had told her not to “mention” an incident in the fingerprinting room in which he allegedly assaulted the suspect at the station in Ballybricken in Waterford city.
Instead, Pratt said she was told to record that the suspect, a man aged in his 20s who had been arrested earlier that morning, had become “aggressive” and that Doyle had tried to restrain him.
The station is the divisional headquarters for the Waterford/Kilkenny/Carlow division.
The court heard further evidence from two other gardaí, including one who said that, after Doyle and the man in custody had exchanged “snide remarks” inside the room, the sergeant told the guards: “Give me two secs there lads.”
Both gardaí stepped outside the room, but went back inside shortly after hearing the sound of “furniture moving” and “pushing”, followed by shouts from the man in custody accusing the sergeant of assault.
Prosecuting on behalf of the State, barrister David Perry told Judge John O’Leary that Doyle is accused of two charges.
One is a section 2 assault against the man in custody, under the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act, and another is of attempting to pervert the course of justice by allegedly requesting no record be taken.
On foot of an investigation by the watchdog body the Garda Ombudsman (GSOC) and a prosecution by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), it is alleged that in March 2022, Doyle assaulted a suspect in Waterford Garda Station.
Doyle is fully contesting the charges.
Testimony was given in court of two alleged incidents, which were reported to have happened within a short space of time on the morning of 9 March 2022.
Pratt was the ‘member in charge’ for the station and its prisoners from 7am that morning when she says she heard a “commotion” and went to a nearby room.
She allegedly witnessed her supervisor, Doyle, “pinning” the main he is accused of assaulting against the window of the ‘Afis room’ (Automated Fingerprint Identification System) where suspects have their fingerprints taken.
The room was repeatedly described in court as small and likened to a “box room” in the station.
Pratt was a probation garda at the time, having graduated 14 months earlier.
She told the court that as she and the man in custody left the room after the alleged altercation, she heard the “sound of a slap” behind her. She said she wasn’t unsure what had caused the sound but heard the man in custody immediately allege that it had been Doyle assaulting him.
Following this, Pratt and the man moved to the custody area down the hall. However, the garda alleged that another incident took place involving the man and Doyle in this room.
She said Doyle had pushed the man “using his chest, kind of a chest on chest push”.
Both men were “shouting at each other” and Pratt recalled seeing the sergeant “make a fist with his right hand and swing for” the man.
She said she didn’t know if he made contact “as there was a wall obstructing my view.” she said.
“I was taken back by the whole thing,” Pratt added.
“I then went into Sergeant Doyle, into the sergeant’s office as he was my supervisor at the time, to try and figure out what had happened. I then asked, I suppose not ‘what do I do’, but how do I carry on from this, as in from the altercation that’s after happening and what I’m after witnessing.”
She further alleged: “Sgt Doyle said don’t mention what happened in the Afis room.”
Pratt said Doyle had told her to maintain he was walking past the custody area when and this was when the man “became aggressive and he [Doyle] entered the custody area to restrain him”.
This information was entered into the station’s custody register by Pratt at 11.05am.
“I didn’t feel right doing it, but I did it,” she said.
She later told GSOC that she was in shock following the incident and had “doubt” in her mind as she made the first entry.
Her statement was read aloud in court.
“[I] didn’t really know to do. I was basically like, what the f**k happened,” she told the Ombudsman
Doyle’s barrister, David Staunton, said that the senior garda never made a request to Pratt to alter the entry into the custody register.
Staunton also pointed to Pratt confirming she never actually saw any alleged assault between the two men.
He stressed Doyle had a “legal entitlement” to respond with proportionate force if he was facing threats.
Meeting upstairs
Following the incident involving Doyle and the man in custody, Pratt said she spoke with detective inspectors upstairs in the station.
She said she was told they were aware an incident had occurred. They also told her that as member in charge she had a “duty to look after prisoners in custody” and that under the Garda code of ethics they have a “duty to report wrongdoing” also.
After the discussions with inspectors, Pratt submitted what she said was the correct entry at 11.44am.
The court heard that Superintendent Anthony Lonergan made a referral to GSOC later that day. The Ombudsman completed its investigation by May of last year, with the DPP recommending prosecution the following August.
The evidence of the man in custody
Evidence provided by the man who had been in custody put forward that Doyle was the one who initiated the exchange between them.
He alleged that he was called a “scumbag and knacker” and claimed that he had tried to “laugh it off”.
This was disputed by two other gardaí in the vicinity who recalled Doyle asking the man about an incident involving an ex-girlfriend. The court heard the man has since been convicted of the assault.
The man further disputed evidence and notes taken at the time two years ago recording him as shouting obscenities at Doyle.
He alleged that Doyle “pinned” him down in the seat and attacked him.
“He was a guard – I couldn’t touch him,” he said. “He gave me a beating.”
The court heard that the man had been seen twice by a doctor during his time in custody. The man arrived after 6am that morning and was first seen at 7.55am and again, after the alleged incident with Doyle, later that afternoon.
Medical notes for both visits show that the man, who was intoxicated when brought to the station, disclosed that he had been assaulted by a garda to the doctor each time.
However, he claimed to not remember telling the doctor about any altercation on the first visit.
Staunton asked: “So if the doctor saw you at 7.55 and you were reporting that you were assaulted by a garda, is he wrong or are you wrong?”
Noting the two medical reports, Staunton said they “repeat” the nature of the injuries observed – similar marks were recorded on his neck, shoulders and back.
The man said he could not explain why that was.
Staunton further criticised that the medical injuries noted in the doctor’s first report, at around 7.50am, were not recorded by Pratt or anyone else in the custody register.
Later, the court heard evidence from Garda Cormac O’Riordan who was the member in charge before Pratt when the man was brought to the station that morning.
O’Riordan said the only use of force recorded before providing custody was that the man was handcuffed.
He told the court that if there were any visible signs of injury to the suspect, he would you have recorded them in the register and said there were “absolutely” none on the suspect that morning.
Evidence of Lane and Colfer
Later in the hearing, the gardaí who were set to interview the man for the alleged offence he was arrested for that morning outside a hotel in the city gave evidence.
Detective Garda Sean Lane and Garda Darren Colfer outlined interactions they saw between Doyle and the suspect.
Lane said he was in the more junior position of ‘Buckshee garda’ at the time, meaning he was wearing plain clothes but that Doyle was his superior.
He alleged Doyle and the man in custody exchanged “snide remarks” at each other. Doyle was in the duty sergeant’s office which the court heard is directly across from the fingerprinting room.
He recalled Doyle asking the suspect if he had been arrested some weeks for an alleged assault of his girlfriend.
This was followed by the man “shouting obscenities” at Doyle. Lane said the suspect called the sergeant a “fat c**t” and a “fat bastard”. The man denied using these terms.
Continuing his evidence before the court, Lane said he tried to calm the situation by telling the man in custody to “ignore” Doyle.
After “less than a minute”, the sergeant made his way towards the Afis room where the man was being detained, Lane said.
He added that Doyle advised the man to remain calm and not to “abuse any members of An Garda Síochána” in the station.
Lane recalled this carried on “for a couple of seconds”, with the man “continuing to shout obscenities” at the sergeant.
“After some time, less than a minute, Sergeant Doyle said to me and Det Garda Colfer: ‘Give me two secs there lads’ – so at that stage I exited the Afis room.”
When asked by Perry what he thought Doyle meant by his words, Lane said he “interpreted that I was to leave the room”.
He added: “He’s a sergeant, I’m a guard.”
Both gardaí left the room and said the door was left “slightly open”.
Standing a number of metres away, Lane said he soon heard “commotion” in the room.
He said this involved “pushing”, a chair being moved, “hitting off the chair, hitting off the printer, wardrobe”.
“You could hear something was happening in there,” Lane said. He told the court the man was shouting and alleging he was being assaulted.
Lane agreed with Staunton, the defence barrister, that Doyle had faced “multiple threats” from the man.
The court heard these included claims that the man said he would “get his job” and “knock his teeth in”, referring to Doyle.
When Lane reentered the room, he said he saw Doyle standing to the side of the man and with his two hands on the top of his shoulders. He said the man was still seated.
Lane told the court that the man was very agitated after the incident, and alleged that he and Colfer “had let it happen” when they stepped outside the Afis room.
While being questioned by the garda sergeant’s barrister, Colfer said he “100 percent” was not part of a “conspiracy” to allow the man be assaulted in the room.
Colfer said he could hear “furniture moving” in the room but explained that he was behind Lane when they reentered, so he believed he saw less.
Asked what he thought Doyle meant by requesting “two secs” alone with the suspect, Colfer said he believed the sergeant would “calm the situation down by talking to him”.
However, he said he could remember seeing Doyle with his both his hands down by his side when he went back inside the Afis room.
He also recalled the man shouting several obscenities at Doyle.
O’Leary, the judge, said he would hear the remaining evidence next month before coming to a verdict.
This will include testimony from Doyle himself and the GSOC investigator for the case.