Amateur snooker champ Colvin O'Brien not guilty of assaulting gardaí
Colvin O'Brien: found not guilty by a jury at Carlow Circuit Court
AN AMATEUR snooker champion has been exonerated by a Carlow Circuit Court jury of charges arising from an incident with two gardaí on 29 August 2024.
Colvin O’Brien (40), Heather Hill Mews, Graiguecullen had pleaded not guilty to assaulting Sgt Ronan Devaney causing him a chipped tooth and assaulting Sgt Matthew Willoughby at John Street, Carlow on 29 August 2024. He further pleaded not guilty to the use of threatening or abusive or insulting words or behaviour on the same date and place. He pleaded guilty to a charge of being intoxicated in a public place.
The court was told the incident arose after Mr O’Brien became highly intoxicated celebrating his recent number one world ranking in world disability snooker and the birth of his daughter. Gardaí were alerted to an inebriated male lying on the footpath on John Street, Carlow by members of the public and they arrived on the scene at around 7.30pm to assist paramedics in getting him into an ambulance.
However, once he was brought to his feet, an altercation ensued. Sgt Willoughby said Mr O’Brien slapped him on the back and released a slew of offensive commentary during this time, which led to him placing the defendant under arrest. The defendant denied these allegations.
In CCTV footage shown to the court, the two gardaí get into a physical struggle with Mr O’Brien, pin him to the ground, place their knee on him, handcuff him and forcibly place him in a doorway while waiting for the garda van to arrive.
The gardaí maintained that the level of force they used was necessary to execute the arrest. Dental records showed Sgt Devaney suffered a chipped tooth and tooth pain from the incident, which, he claimed, was because Mr O’Brien had elbowed him in the chin.
Mr O’Brien submitted photographs of bruising to the side of his body from the day after the incident.
During the course of the trial, which began on 5 March, defence barrister Bairbre Ryan BL maintained that her client had acted in self-defence due to heavy-handed tactics used by the gardaí.
Under cross-examination of former Sgt Devaney, Ms Ryan questioned whether it was a “reasonable response” to Mr O’Brien allegedly changing his demeanour and balling his fists for the gardaí to “take him, turn him around, put him on the ground and sit on him”.
Ms Ryan pointed out an instance on the tape where the garda kneed Mr O’Brien in the back three times and suggested “this was not reasonable force”.
Sgt Devaney disagreed and, by way of explanation, said he was trying to get the defendant in a prone position to “handle him more effectively”. However, Ms Ryan established his agreement that “the only thing moving there is your knee”.
Ms Ryan put it to Sgt Willoughby that “you pushed him to the ground, you kneed him in the back, your colleague kneed him in the back three times and you pushed his face into your steel-cap boot”.
In response, Sgt Willoughby said: “My opinion is that reasonable force was used here due to the high level of aggression from Mr O’Brien.”
Sgt Devaney said: “We approached him with the absolute intention of getting him into the ambulance.”
The jury requested to view the CCTV footage of the incident again during their deliberations. They returned with a not guilty verdict on all three counts after 45 minutes of deliberation.
