A GOLFER appeared before a court in Co Cork yesterday on charges of assaulting three children who were irritating him while he was playing a round of golf.
Instead of convicting Mr Patrick Hourihan, a civil engineer from Manor Close, Thornbury Estate, Rochestown, Cork, after he pleaded guilty in Blarney District Court to assaulting the children, Judge John Clifford gave him the benefit of the Probation Act.
However, he wamed the defendant that this was not a precedent and asked him for an undertaking that he would not take the law in his own hands again.
Insp Mick Scanlon said that Mr Hourihan was playing golf at Muskerry Golf Club in Cork on June 6th last when he became involved in "a stupid event". Three children were allegedly annoying and distracting the golfers and Mr Hourihan had made a run at them and struck them.
He broke his golf club in the melee and one boy received an injury to a finger, while a girl received a back injury.
Judge Clifford said: "I know children can be irritating, but there are measures that can be taken to stop the irritation. It would be frightful to convict a 40-year-old man with no previous convictions of assault."
Mr Eugene Murphy, defending solicitor, said that Mr Hourihan went out with two friends to enjoy a day's golf. At the 16th hole a large number of children were taunting them. The three partners drove off and one of them was so upset that he "knocked" his drive. As they walked down the fairway, there was a surge of about 13 or 14 young people, one of them on a bicycle.
Mr Hourihan found himself intimidated by the young people and decided it was "either him or them", Mr Murphy said. While he accepted that a golf club had been broken, he said this had occurred in a confrontation between the defendant and a teenager with a stick. The youngsters were trespassing and Mr Hourihan had received a blow to the side of his head, which broke his glasses.
Judge Clifford said that the defendant's action was unacceptable. He asked Mr Hourihan for an undertaking that he would not repeat what had happened. "You were wrong to attack those youngsters. I am not condoning what you did, but it would be excessive to convict a 40-year-old man of previous good character for something like this, and I am dismissing the case under the Probation Offenders Act".