Hotel brawl victim names as senior UK bank executive

THE man who died on Sunday after a brawl at a Dublin hotel was a senior English banking executive.

THE man who died on Sunday after a brawl at a Dublin hotel was a senior English banking executive.

Mr Francis Tomlinson (42), a married man with three children from Bishops Stortford, Hertfordshire, died at 7.30 p.m. on Sunday in the Mater Hospital. He died as a result of injuries received when he was kicked in the head during a fight at around 1 a.m. on Saturday.

Two men were questioned in Store Street Garda station on Saturday for a number of hours. They were released at 5.30 p.m. A file is being prepared for the DPP.

The incident occurred in a second-floor corridor of Jurys Custom House Inn, in the Custom House docks area.

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The four men involved in the fight were in two of a number of stag party groups staying in the hotel last weekend, according to the Garda.

The deceased was an associate director and head of business development with Nomura Capital Management (UK) Ltd, a London subsidiary of the Japanese in vestment banking group, Nomura.

He was a key member of the London European team and a senior member of the operation.

A spokesman for the bank said: "Everyone here is deeply distressed by the news. Francis was greatly liked by all his colleagues and clients and will be sorely missed."

Nomura Capital Management is involved in managing capital funds for corporate clients. The Nomura group is the largest investment banking group in the world.

Mr Tomlinson had three children, a daughter aged nine, and young twin boys.

He travelled to Dublin on Friday morning on business. Later, as arranged, he joined the stag party at the hotel. He and his brother, Anthony, and others had been drinking for a number of hours before the incident.

At around 1 a.m. Mr Tomlinson took the lift from the lobby to the second floor. He shared the lift with a man who had been drinking with a separate English stag party. They came upon Mr Tomlinson's brother and a colleague of the man in the lift, arguing, possibly over noise coming from one of their rooms.

"A row developed and the deceased was knocked to the ground. He received a kick or kicks to the head and that's what caused his death" a senior garda said.

There were no independent witnesses of the incident. The Garda source said the men involved"seemed to have consumed an awful lot of intoxicating liquor."

All the men involved were in their 40s and from professional backgrounds.

"They were not trouble-makers," the garda said.

Mr Tomlinson's wife and daughter travelled to Dublin on Saturday morning to be with him in hospital. They returned to England yesterday morning.

The Garda source said that as many as seven stag party groups could have been in the hotel at the weekend. A spokesman for the hotel, where rooms cost £55 per night, said they had not known Mr Tomlinson was part of a stag party and that he and the others had booked in individually.

There had been no atmosphere of trouble brewing in the run-up to the incident. "This seems to have happened out of the blue."

Jurys would not encourage stag parties to book into its hotels, the spokesman said.

Colm Keena

Colm Keena

Colm Keena is an Irish Times journalist. He was previously legal-affairs correspondent and public-affairs correspondent