A FORMER bread delivery man has settled a High Court action in which he alleged gardaí injured him after they used a stun grenade to capture two bank robbers.
The robbers had used Séamus O’Neill’s van – and taken him with them – in a dramatic escape attempt.
Mr O’Neill (63), Farm Road, Annagassan, Co Louth, claimed gardaí beat him and handcuffed him when they dragged him from the van believing him to be one of the robbers.
In his action for damages against the State and against the two robbers, he claimed gardaí used excessive force and failed to heed warnings that he was a hostage rather than a criminal. The claims were denied.
The case against the State began last Friday before Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne and a jury and was about to go into its second day yesterday when Eoghan Fitzsimons SC, for Mr O’Neill, said the parties had come to terms and the case was not proceeding.
Counsel sought and secured orders striking out the case and for Mr O’Neill’s costs on the High Court scale.
Discharging the jury, Ms Justice Dunne said it was a unique case and she was sure the jury would agree Mr O’Neill had “a fairly appalling experience”.
The cases against the robbers, Gareth McKeown, Mountpleasant, Newry, Co Down, and Desmond Carroll, High Street, Bessbrook, Co Armagh were adjourned last Friday and, in light of yesterday’s settlement, are not expected to proceed.
The court was told last week McKeown and Carroll were part of a three-man robbery at the Bank of Ireland in Dunleer, Co Louth, on September 1st, 2000, when a firearm may have been discharged. McKeown was later sentenced to five years imprisonment and Carroll to nine years.
Their getaway car collided with a truck and while the third man, who was never caught, ran off across fields, McKeown and Carroll hijacked a Garda car at gunpoint. They drove towards Dromin before abandoning the car and running off into fields themselves, Mr Fitzsimons said.
Shortly afterwards, Mr O’Neill was delivering bread to a home in Dromin when McKeown came out of that house carrying a gun and told Mr O’Neill they were taking his van and him with it. They set off with Mr O’Neill sitting on the gearbox in the middle of the van before they came upon a Garda checkpoint and drove through it.
There followed a “dramatic and lengthy” chase in which the van collided with a number of cars to get past traffic and a roadblock which had been set up by gardaí in Slane, the court heard.
Mr O’Neill said he was terrified when they reached speeds of about 130 km/h.
About 5km beyond Slane, a Garda car managed to bump the van and spin it around while another vehicle boxed it in. A stun grenade was thrown into the cab and Mr O’Neill said he found himself blinded from the explosion.
He was dragged from the van, thrown on the ground, hit repeatedly and handcuffed. There were two people on top of him and only when a detective arrived who knew him was he released.
He had shrapnel from the explosion removed from his broken left arm and treatment for burns to his chest, right arm and injury to his left thigh, the court heard. He continues to suffer from those injuries and was diagnosed with post traumatic stress. Although he had worked all his life, as a farmer, publican and later a breadman, he had not worked since because of the effect of the injury and stress of the incident, he said.