Garda ‘expected to die’ while hanging on to high woman’s car

A garda has said he expected to die when a woman, who was high on crack cocaine, accelerated away as he was attempting to seize her vehicle.

Garda Thomas Gallagher (39) read his victim impact statement during the sentence hearing of Christina Joyce (30), who was jailed for 4½ years.

He said he felt he had to hold onto the door of the Volvo car to stop himself from being pulled under the vehicle.

“There was nothing I could do. If I let go (of the driver’s door) I would be dragged under the car. I had nowhere to go. I accepted at that stage I was dead. The speed we were going I thought there was no way I wouldn’t be killed,” he told Judge Martin Nolan.

Garda Gallagher said he noticed that Joyce seemed to be driving her vehicle in the direction of a parked car across the road so he felt he had to let go of the door. He fell to the ground and skidded into the parked car.

He said he was convinced at that point that “everything below my knee was gone, that it was shattered. I consider myself extremely lucky that I am alive and able to walk”.

Brace

Garda Gallagher dislocated his knee and had to remain in a brace for eight weeks. He also injured his shoulder and was told he could not return to playing sports for about two years. He has has not yet returned to work.

Joyce, a mother of three of no fixed abode, admitted endangering Garda Gallagher and assaulting him causing him harm on April 9th last.

She also admitted two charges of trespass, damaging a wall and damaging a car on the same date. She has 67 previous convictions for assault, failure to appear, public order, drugs, theft and fraud, road traffic offences, assaulting a police officer and criminal damage.

Keith Spencer BL, defending said his client was one of 14 siblings and was taken into care as a three-week-old baby. She began self harming aged nine and has made suicide attempts. Joyce is a paranoid schizophrenic who suffers from both auditory and visual hallucinations, counsel said.

Sgt Ronan Waldron told Dara Hayes BL, prosecuting that Joyce, who had a male passenger with her, continued to drive at speed after her encounter with Garda Gallagher and ultimately crashed into a Dublin City Council van.

Break-ins

Joyce and the man then broke into the home of a 77-year-old woman, in an atempt to escape gardaí. They broke into a second nearby apartment where gardaí­ found them and arrested them.

There was €1,622 worth of damage caused to the wall of a building Joyce had earlier crashed into and €1,200 worth of damage was caused to a parked car she and her accomplice had jumped on top of to scale a wall.

Judge Nolan imposed a 4½ year sentence which he said must be consecutive to a term Joyce is already serving for assault and theft. She was on bail for these offences in April and was due for release next September.

He disqualified her from driving for six years.

Mr Spencer said his client was “shocked and ashamed when she heard the evidence” and had written a letter of apology to Garda Gallagher.

He said Joyce was left with disfiguring injuries after her face was slashed when she was attending her methadone clinic, so she had “huge empathy” for Garda Gallagher.