Man to pay €5,000 compo for broken bottle assault

A 62-year-old man, who was found guilty by a jury of assaulting another man with a broken bottle, has had his sentence hearing deferred to October after he showed up in court with €2,000 compensation for the victim.

Peadar Macken, a native of Rosmuc, and c/o The Fairgreen Hostel, Galway, has also promised to pay an additional €3,000 by October to Martin Whelan (66) from Beal an Dangan, Leitir Mór, whom he stabbed in the throat and face with a broken bottle at Mr Whelan’s home, on May 28, 2008.

Macken pleaded not guilty during a three-day trial at Galway Circuit Criminal Court last November to assaulting Mr Whelan, causing him harm, at Beal an Dangan, Leitir Mór on May 28, 2008.

He also denied a second charge of producing a broken bottle capable of causing injury, while committing the assault, on the same occasion.

Sentence was adjourned to last week.

Mr Whelan sustained a deep laceration to his throat and cheek in the drink-fuelled attack.

Macken had been homeless at the time and he asked Whelan earlier on the date of the attack, when he met him by chance in Galway city, if he could come and stay with him for a bit.

Both men travelled on the bus to Carraroe that evening and began drinking in Whelan’s house.

Whelan told the trial that when he asked Macken later that night not to smoke in bed, he became very violent and hit him on the side of the head with a whiskey bottle.  The bottle broke and when Whelan fell to the ground, Macken kneeled on his chest and stabbed him in the neck and face.

He began bleeding profusely but managed to stagger from the house and raise the alarm.  Gardaí and ambulance personnel quickly arrived at the scene.

Macken claimed he could not remember any of the events of that night when he was arrested by Sgt. Brendan Kineavy.

Macken was later charged with the offences but insisted he have his trial heard through Irish in front of a bilingual jury.

The application was refused in the Circuit Criminal Court in 2009, and that decision was appealed to the High Court and later the Supreme Court.  Both superior courts upheld the Circuit Court ruling.

Judge Rory McCabe referred last Friday to the seven-year delay in bringing the case to trial and said it was “a ferocious waste of taxpayer’s money” as Macken had effectively abandoned any objections he had to having the trial heard in Irish, once a trial date had been fixed.

Hearing Macken had not drank in six and a half years, was remorseful and wanted to pay an additional €3,000 to the victim, Judge McCabe adjourned sentence to October 6.

He asked Sgt. Kineavy to speak to the victim and see if he wanted to accept the compensation at all.

The judge said he wanted Macken assessed in the meantime by the probation service to see if he was a suitable candidate to carry out community service in lieu of a prison sentence.

He indicated that if Whelan was not willing to accept compensation the matter could be brought back before the court.