Car drives into demonstraters at Shannon

national | anti-war / imperialism | news report Tuesday December 09, 2003 20:48 by dunk duncancrowley at hotmail dot com

White car 96 CE 1367- what can be done?

Saturday 8th December 2003 @ 4.03 pm White car (96 CE 1367) drove into a protest, knocking someone onto his bonnet
gardai were informed
what to do now?
have you any pix or film, did you witness it

After the demo, @ 4.00, last Saturday a crowd had lingered for some time around a main roundabout .
(Roundabout between 4 and 6 on map http://www.indymedia.ie/newswire.php?story_id=62605)
A lot of gardai and riot squad were blocking off the north western edge which led back into the industrial estate.
Some incident happened away from the roundabout and many people moved over to that, there were only a few people still by the main roundabout.

2 cars were attempting to get through the demo and a garda was spotted waving on the first (white) car to make an attempt to go through.
I went over to the driver of the first car (white 96 CE 1367 ) and politely informed him “that there was still a demonstration on and that he wouldn’t be getting through so the best thing for him to do would be to reverse and head in a different route”- he responded, quite angrily about “hippies and protestors” so I just told him I was informing him of the situation and went back to where I had been previous, a few meters in front of the car. He then edged foreword a bit. I shouted to a few protestors nearby and they came over, he edged foreword further and I walked up to the front of the car and waved my arms saying “you’re not getting through”. He then put the foot down and drove into me, knocking me onto the bonnet of his car. I had not expected this and was a bit shook. By this stage many protestors ran over to the car and things got heated. The gardai ran over and tried to force the protestors from the car

(http://www.indymedia.org.uk/media/2003/12/282597.wmv shows a scene from this, where a protestor opens the passenger car door- it’s about 5 minutes into the film)

im not too sure what exactly happened next because I told a garda that I had been driven into- I gave him my details and he said the details of the driver had been taken
he was Garda XXXXX-XXXXX [edited out at poster's request. Details are with author]
he asked me if i had any injuries, there were 2 black marks on the right knee of my trousers and when i rolled up my trousers, there was a small bit of skin that had a small bit of blood just formed on it. he said to give him a call later

the driver then started insisting that he was going to a funeral, perhaps he was? But wearing sports clothes and heading into the industrial area makes that a bit odd?

Protestors said he would be quicker reversing out and heading away as he was not getting through the blockade
He eventually did, after engaging in more heated words with an indymedia cameraman
after this a radio reporter from griffith college radio interviewed me.

I talked to the legal support team about what I should do, and I have talked to 2 legal people subsequently. I will contact the garda soon

I have looked around and have not found any report of this incident, both in mainstream media and indymedia. Id be grateful if people could add any photos that they have of the incident, add their report of the incident, or a short film piece if they have it

im not sure what i should really do- i would just like the public to know that this sort of carry on happened

thanks in advance
dunk