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A man in his 50s, who Fine Gael Senator John McGahon is accused of seriously assaulting, has told Dundalk Circuit Court that he never had a grip of the defendant by the neck and denied that the accused had acted in self-defence.
Mr McGahon (31) of Faughart Gardens, St Mary’s Road, Dundalk is on trial, having pleaded not guilty to a charge of assaulting Breen White causing him harm on Park Street in the Co Louth town on June 16th, 2018.
On Wednesday, when his cross examination by the defence resumed, Mr White denied pulling the accused to the ground outside The Rumhouse or pushing him into the centre of the pavement.
When senior counsel Hugh Hartnett put it to him that he’d had a grip of Mr McGahon by the throat, he replied: “I never had a grip of John by the neck.”
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When CCTV footage was replayed for the jury, and Mr Hartnett asked if Mr White if saw his hand on the defendant’s throat, he said the accused had been poking at him, “being a bully”, and when he was asked if he had pushed him out onto the street, he replied: “No.”
When Mr Hartnett suggested the “maul” of his wife, which Mr White had referred to on the first day of the trial on Tuesday, “was an arm around a shoulder in a friendly way”, Mr White replied: “I didn’t see it that way”.
Mr White’s wife Linda told the jury she had held her blazer over her head when she was about to walk out of The Rumhouse as it was drizzling. She felt someone coming around with their arm who said “come on, you’re coming home with me, or come with me”. She said the arm was swaying or pulling her in the opposite direction to which she was going.
She said she didn’t know the man and just waved him away. She said she was standing under a ledge out of the rain with her husband when Mr McGahon stood in front of them and started questioning her husband, asking him who he was, and then saying: “Can she not speak for herself?”
She said Mr White told Mr McGahon he was her husband and to go away, but the accused was within arm’s reach of them, “poking” her husband in the chest. Ms White claimed the accused was aggressive and sneering and Mr White told him to get back and stop poking him.
She said three of Mr McGahon’s friends were pushing him back, but he broke free and brought her husband to the ground.
When Mr Hartnett asked if she remembered her husband pushing his client out onto the street, Ms White said no. “It was John that was coming for Breen all the time.”
When it was put to her that her husband had pulled the accused to the ground, she said: “I think he slipped there.
“Breen didn’t attack John. John attacked Breen,” she added.
Mr White’s son Cormac Rafferty told the jury he had parked across the street from The Rumhouse and crossed over to tell Ms White where he was parked when, he said, “out of nowhere there was a scuffle”.
He added: “The next thing I know, Dad is lying on the ground being punched repeatedly on the head by John McGahon whose friends were trying to pull him off my father.”
During cross examination, Mr Rafferty said what he had witnessed happened within seconds of his arrival at the scene but he acknowledged that he had not seen what led up to what he had witnessed.
The trial continues tomorrow before 11 jurors – four men and seven women after one of the jury members was taken ill last night.