case against Burlington protestor dismissed

national | miscellaneous | news report Thursday March 14, 2002 11:12 by Conor Mc Loughlin - WSM conor at krossphader dot com PO Box 1528 Dublin 8

Next cases July 10th

Case against Rory dismissed ! Garda evidence suspiciously alike Benefit in Mono on Monday for remaining defendents

Well done Rory heres a full court report
by krossphader - WSM Thu, Mar 14 2002, 10:07am
address: po Box 1528 dublin 8 [email protected]

First Case against Burlington protestor dismissed in Dublin district court!

As many off you probably know 14 people (myself included) were arrested for
at an anti privitisation demo at the Burlington hotel last October. The
first full hearing came up today (March 13th) with the case of Rory Hearne
from Globalize Resistence and the SWP.

I wasn't a witness so I got to sit through the whole thing and study the
machinations of the capitalist justice system at district court level in
great detail!

Firstly the Gardai tried to change the name of the charging Garda to that of
the inspector on duty that day they had already added a new charge at the
last hearing. The intention hear was clearly to make a more general case
against Rory. The judge ruled this was a material change bought in at the
last minute and ruled it out (this actually may have been the turning point
of the entire case). They then wanted to use a video seized off Rohan,
another defendant. The judge ruled that as he wasn?t there and the gardai
had no proof of who made the film or permission to use it that this was also
in admissible. However (could be crucial for other cases) he did allow
digital photos taken and printed by Andrew Flood of the WSM of Guards with
sticks torn off placards to be used in evidence (several of these pictures
are at www.indymedia.ie)

The gardai had about 8 garda and special branch witnesses to construct a
case that Rory had called for and lead a charge at the hotel that he called
for an " angry and militant protest " and so on. His solicitor Pat ?
carefully questioned the cops and it soon became clear from several repeated
errors in them that they might well have been agreed in advance (This was
like catching the unfortunate child who copies his home work from another
weak student e.g. protestors "water is a public resort" instead of
"resource" or that they all thought Joe Higgins was in the SWP errors
repeated in almost all the statements) The garda evidence went on until
almost 3 in the afternoon.

Then the solicitor pointed out that,in fact, there was only one statement
relating to the arrest and that this had happened outside the hotel AFTER
the major confrontation and baton charge. The arresting guard said that he
had intervened to help another guard after Rory tried to pull the second cop
away from making an arrest. How ever the arresting guard did not even know
who THAT guard was and he wasn?t present as a prosecution witness. When 2
independent witnesses AND a photo from the Irish Times showed clearly that
at least 3 guards, none of whom had been the supposed arresting guard, had
grabbed Rory who wasn't doing anything at that time, it was clear that the
prosecution were on a sticky wicket.

In dismissing the case the judge (sorry don't know the name but apparently
he's one of the better ones in so far as any of them are "good"!) ruled that if the guards were concerned with
what had happened in the grounds of the hotel they should have charged the
defendant on that basis. However he was only arrested for an alleged
incident outside at the railings and this was the case he had to consider.
So most of the day?s evidence was irrelevant! As there were 2 contradictory
versions and the state only had one witness to their version reasonable
doubt existed and the case was dismissed

Also please not a benefit for the rest of the defendants which is unusual
(IMHO) in being in a good venue and having 2 really great DJS!

Reggae DUB Roots - Selecta Dixi Jazz fm
Deep groovy techno and electro - Eamonn Doyle (D1/Active Service Unit)
Mono Wexford st downstairs Monday March 18th
Euros 5/7 waged

krossphader

www.neuromantek.com
www.krossphader.com