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Drink and drug driver (30) left off-duty garda for dead in ditch after knocking him off bicycle

Niamh McDonnell (30) had consumed five vodkas and five shots of whiskey and tequila on the day in question

Niamh McDonnell was captured on CCTV drinking in the pub before the collision. Photograph: Brendan Gleeson

David Raleigh
Mon Nov 13 2023 - 21:46

A Limerick mother-of-two left an off-duty Garda inspector for dead in a ditch after severing his foot when she knocked him down off his bicycle while high on a cocktail of drink and drugs, a court has heard.

Niamh McDonnell (30) woke up on the morning in question and smoked a cannabis joint before going to work at a creche in west county Limerick.

After finishing work around 2.30pm, McDonnell went to a pub where she consumed five vodkas and five shots of whiskey and tequila.

McDonnell, from Gortskagh, Castlemahon, Co Limerick, turned down an offer from a friend to drive her home from the pub on June 30th, 2022.

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Instead of accepting the lift, McDonnell got behind the wheel of her mother-in-law’s navy blue Volkswagen Passat, heavily intoxicated.

On her route home, she crashed into off-duty Inspector Niall Flood (53) from behind, Limerick Circuit heard.

Mr Flood, who was cycling on a straight stretch of road, wearing safety clothing and with a flashing light on his bike, was thrown onto the bonnet of the car and into the air before landing chest-deep in a foot of water in a ditch.

The garda, who was based at Newcastle West Garda station, was left with “life-changing injuries”, the court heard.

Mr Flood’s foot was “ripped off” in the impact and he was left temporarily blind and “bleeding out” in the ditch. He also fractures to his spine, shoulder and ribs.

McDonnell did not stop after hitting the garda, and drove home with her windscreen smashed and with a flat tyre. A Garda forensic examination of the scene could not find any evidence McDonnell had ever applied the car’s brakes.

The court heard that when McDonnell got home, her partner discovered the severed foot still wedged into the front of the car and he alerted gardaí and the emergency services.

A motorist who witnessed the hit and run saved Mr Flood’s life by making a tourniquet for his injured leg before he was airlifted from the scene to Cork University Hospital.

McDonnell initially lied to gardaí telling them she had only one drink before driving. However, after gardaí presented her with CCTV footage of her drinking in the pub and bar receipts of the alcohol she had consumed, she admitted drinking the five vodkas and five shots and said she had “panicked” when she hit Mr Flood.

In his victim statement, Niall Flood, who could not attend court due to his ongoing struggle with his injuries said that what McDonnell did to him was “unforgivable and incomprehensible”.

“I was struck from the rear by a drunk and drug driver who left me for dead and bleeding out,” he wrote.

Mr Flood’s wife, Margaret Flood, fought back tears telling how she and her husband had been left “psychologically and physically traumatised” by McDonnell’s “criminal” actions.

“She (McDonnell) drove off and left him for dead, that is the cruel nature of the defendant...you would stop if you hit a dog,” she said. “It has turned our lives upside down, this was no accident.”

McDonnell’s barrister, Brian McInerney SC, agreed his client’s actions on the day had been “criminal”.

He said McDonnell had suffered from “mental health problems” arising out of “traumatic and horrible experiences throughout her childhood”.

However, Mr McInerney said McDonnell was not the victim, “the only victim here is Niall Flood”.

McDonnell pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing serious bodily harm to Mr Flood, driving while drunk, failing to stop at the scene, failing to provide assistance at the scene, and driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs.

Judge Tom O’Donnell said he would finalise sentencing on Friday, November 24th.

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