A DETECTIVE garda, whose shoulder was dislocated in a struggle with an instructor during baton training, has been awarded more than €22,000 damages in the Circuit Civil Court.
Barrister Karl Finnegan told the court that Detective Garda Darragh O’Toole was in mock combat with an instructor, who was wearing a red padded suit, when the incident happened.
The Red Man, as he was known to gardaí undergoing training with the new extendable steel baton, staged a fight scene with Garda O’Toole in which he demonstrated attack and defence moves.
Garda O’Toole, a former senior footballer with Erin’s Isle GAA club in Finglas, Dublin, said he had been part of a group taking part in a Garda baton training course at Mount Pleasant Tennis Club, Ranelagh, Dublin, in October 2008.
In the fight session, he had held his baton in his right hand with it resting on his right shoulder and had his left arm protectively extended out in front of him.
The instructor locked his arm around Garda O’Toole’s extended left arm in a manner that would not allow him to bend his elbow joint. With his left arm in a locked and extended position, he had been forced back against a wall.
Circuit Court president Mr Justice Matthew Deery heard that the instructor had continued pressing forward and, as he did so, Garda O’Toole’s shoulder was dislocated through the back of the joint.
In a reserved judgment yesterday, Judge Deery said the fight scene had become very boisterous and he felt the instructor ought to have eased off when Garda O’Toole had been backed up against the wall.
The judge said Garda O’Toole (41), had suffered a significant injury which had resulted in his missing work for 14 weeks.
At age 38, he had still been a senior club footballer and had returned to it as a result of having worked particularly hard on his rehabilitation, for which he was mainly personally responsible.
Judge Deery rejected evidence that the injury had been caused merely by a sweeping motion of the instructor’s right arm driving Garda O’Toole’s left arm backwards. He said medical reports provided by his solicitors Murray Flynn Maguire had revealed this was not a way in which Garda O’Toole’s injury could have been caused and that it had arisen from a frontal attack.
Awarding him €22,650 in damages and costs against the Minister for Justice, the judge said Garda O’Toole still suffered some element of pain from his injury.