Leading republican Mr Gerry Kelly has been awarded £9,000 compensation after a policeman hit him on the head with a baton. At Belfast Recorder's Court yesterday, Mr Kelly sued the RUC for £15,000, including exemplary and aggravated damages. After talks between lawyers for both sides, the case was settled out of court.
Afterwards Mr Kelly said: "I was the only person to be hit and I believe I was singled out because I am the Sinn Fein spokesman on policing."
Mr Kelly said that although the RUC officer could be clearly identified by the crowd, he had not been prosecuted. "The RUC said they inspected the batons and they were all clean," he said. "Everyone is talking about a new policing service and here we have a wall of silence."
A Northern Ireland Unionist Party MLA, Mr Norman Boyd, condemned the award, saying that the "vast majority of decent law-abiding people" in Northern Ireland would be "outraged" by the settlement.
Barrister Mr Gerard McAlinden, for Mr Kelly, told Judge Derek Rodgers the action had been settled for £9,000 and the RUC had agreed to pay Mr Kelly's legal costs. The case arose out of disturbances on Springfield Road in west Belfast last June when an Orange parade passed through a nationalist area. Mr Kelly was taken to hospital with blood gushing from his head wound and had to receive three stitches.
A lawyer for the RUC applied for the return of a police video of the incident which had been supplied to Mr Kelly's solicitors under the rules of discovery. The application was opposed by Mr McAlinden, who said the video was a copy of the original and as it was a properly discoverable document, his client was entitled to hold on to it.
"Once it was furnished by way of discovery, the plaintiff is entitled to retain it and make whatever use of it he sees fit," Mr McAlinden said.
Judge Rodgers adjourned the application until after lunch, when a lawyer for the RUC said it was no longer seeking the return of the video.
Outside the court, Mr Kelly told reporters he thought his head injury was worth about £3,000 compensation. "The rest is what you might call exemplary damages because I am a public representative. "I was there to try to calm the situation . . . they won't admit any RUC man used his baton on me, although the crowd clearly saw him do it."
Mr Kelly said he wanted to retain the RUC video for personal reasons. "It is also a matter of historical importance and if I ever decide to write a book it could end up in it," he said.