Garda tells of horror attack by two pit bulls

A savage attack by two pit bull terriers on a Garda conducting a drugs search at a house in the Claddagh during the summer of 2008 was recalled again last week at a High Court hearing in Dublin.

Uniformed officers and members of the Garda Drugs Unit had been engaged in a heroin search on the house at St Dominick’s Road, when they were savagely attacked by the pit bull terriers.

One of the Gardaí involved in the search – Detective Garda John Leahy – suffered horrific cuts and a gash to his leg in the attack, and is bringing a claim for compensation against the State in relation to the incident.

The proceedings date back to the night of June 26, 2008, when a Garda search party entered the house in the Claddagh that had seven people inside at the time.

During the course of a struggle that ensued during the course of the search, three dogs were ‘released’ from another room in the house with two of the pit bulls ripping into the trousers of Det Gda Leahy and the flesh of his leg.

Det Gda Leahy’s colleagues eventually managed to pull the dogs off him, but he had to be rushed to University Hospital Galway where emergency medical treatment had to be administered.

One of the wounds required 100 stitches and had left Det Gda Leahy’s leg with multiple scars, the Garda Compensation Hearing at the High Court was told this week.

One man present on the night of the search was subsequently convicted of impeding a member of the Gardaí by putting drugs in his mouth and for resisting attempts by Gardaí to prevent him from swallowing the substance.

John Tompkins (39) with an address at Ard Alainn, Ballybane, was sentenced to 17 months imprisonment by Judge Aeneas McCarthy following his conviction. The court heard that Tompkins had 16 previous convictions.

At the time of the incident, city councillor Terry O’Flaherty called for the putting in place of a total ban on dangerous and aggressive dog breeds.

“It appears to me that someone will have to be maimed – or worse still, killed – in this country, before any action will be taken to ban those highly dangerous breed of dogs,” Cllr O’Flaherty said at the time.

A colleague of Det Gda Leahy, Garda Orla Keenan, who was involved in the search of the house that night, told this week’s High Court hearing that it was one of the worst experiences of her life.

She described how the dogs had “ripped open” Det Gda Leahy’s leg with “blood everywhere” – Gda Keenan broke down as she gave her evidence before Mr Justice Bernard Barton.

The incident on the Thursday night of June 26, 2008, began when both Det Gda Leahy and Gda Keenan noticed a known heroin addict and another man acting in a suspicious manner in the Spanish Arch area at around 10.45pm.

Later, the men were seen entering the house at St Dominick’s Road, leading to a full search of the house that night by Gardai, during which the dog attack occurred. Seven men in the house were arrested at the time.

During the course of the search, according to Garda evidence at a subsequent court case, one of the occupants of the housed swallowed a package suspected of containing heroin.

When the man was challenged about what he had swallowed, Det Gda Leahy later recalled in court evidence, that the name ‘bull’ was called out, at which point the dogs were released from the room.

The dog attack lasted about 15 to 20 minutes, according to the resultant court case, with one of the pit bulls only being released after being ‘semi-choked’ by one of the Gardai.

Two dogs were later seized by Gardaí with the help of the city’s dog warden and put down – in a follow-up search of the house after the initial incident, the dogs also attempted to attack the Gardaí.

During this week’s High Court compensation hearing, Det Gda Leahy outlined the extent of the injuries that he had suffered in the attack and its subsequent impact on him.

He said that the attack had exacerbated a degenerative condition in his back, had caused hip pain and had left his leg badly scarred.

Mr Justice Barton reserved his judgment in the case to a later date.