An ambulance could not be sent sooner to take battered Ballymoney RUC man Greg Taylor to hospital because the crew were asleep in bed, it was claimed yesterday. Although the local hospital is only 600 yards away from where the 41-year-old policeman was attacked on June 1st last year, it took over half an hour to arrive. The claim that "someone had to be awoken" from their bed was made by defence counsel Mr Arthur Harvey QC while cross-examining the RUC duty officer in Ballymoney on the night of the attack.
The constable denied there was no ambulance on duty that night, claiming it was elsewhere. The RUC man also told the Belfast trial of the eight Co Antrim men, who deny the murder of Const Taylor, that a patrol car could not be sent sooner either because it too was somewhere else.
The Crown Court heard it had been sent to nearby Cloughmills to check on a suspected disturbance which turned out to be a group of people waiting for a taxi. The RUC man said he had received two mobile phone calls from Const Taylor requesting that a car be sent to Kelly's bar "to help him leave the premises". Later, he denied that it appeared to him that the RUC man was simply "looking for a lift home" from the bar. "No. Definitely not, definitely not," he replied to the defence suggestion. But the constable admitted he had not recorded in his first statement what Const Taylor had said to him, although he claimed "it was something I wasn't likely to forget". He later added that he'd made that statement the next day and that it had been "a dramatic night".
In a second statement he noted he had received one call from Const Taylor about being in a bar and a hostile crowd who were attacking "his mates". Asked why he'd written that, the constable replied "I'm afraid I can't say". However, a transcript of his radio communications with the patrol car he sent to Const Taylor's aid stated the car should go to the bar because "there might be a bit of bother".