A Clare man who was highly abusive and insulting to gardai and hospital staff and had to be held down to be treated in A&E was described in court as a “nuisance and a menace”.
Judge Raymond Groarke made the comments at the Galway Circuit Appeals Court last Tuesday after hearing the details of the charges brought against John Higgins who lodged an appeal against the severity of a sentence imposed in the district court.
The 29-year-old with an address at 93 Clancy Park, Ennis, Co Clare, had been before Galway District Court in late February of this year and received a total of three months in jail for two counts of threatening and abusive behaviour. He also received a three-month sentence suspended for 12 months for failing to give his name and address and a fine of €200 for being intoxicated in a public place.
In the circuit court this week, Garda Liam Mcauliffe said that on December 17, 2009, in Eyre Square he came across a man who was staggering on and off the footpath. Gardai also noticed that the man’s tracksuit had a lot of blood on it and an ambulance was called. However, when Higgins got into the ambulance he began “ripping stuff off the walls” and Garda McAuliffe had to restrain him. “He told me he would rip my head off,” said Garda McAuliffe who added that Higgins continued to be abusive in the A&E and had to be arrested.
Describing the abuse hurled at him and hospital staff Garda McAuliffe said: “He said that me and other members of the gardai were a shower of pigs” and he told a doctor to “f**k off back to your own country and don’t touch me with that needle”. Higgins had to be held down by four to five people in order to be treated and an X-ray taken.
That same day gardai received a call at 8.30pm to go to Ceannt Station where there were reports of a man threatening staff. Higgins made the threats after being refused entry onto a bus. He told gardai to “f**k off” and refused to give him name and address.
Defence barrister, Ms Aisling Wall BL, said that her client, who has 27 previous convictions, has had difficulties with alchohol. She said that Higgins had been refused entry onto the bus because there had been blood all over his clothes after being at the hospital.
“This man has serious problems. When drink is taken he has no respect for himself or for others,” said Judge Groarke who imposed a three-month sentence, to run concurrently, on each of the convictions.
