A man who claims a garda assaulted him at the 2002 Reclaim the Streets march in Dublin has identified himself on video footage of the event being struck three times by a garda with a baton.
Mr Fergal Leddy (35) was giving evidence in the trial, at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court, in which Garda Paul Tallon of Mountjoy Garda station has denied assaulting him on May 6th, 2002, at Dame Street.
Mr Leddy pointed out to Mr Thomas O'Connell SC, prosecuting (with Mr Bernard Condon), a frame in the video in which he said he could see himself lying on the ground while he protected himself from blows.
Mr Leddy described the Reclaim the Streets march as a protest against "the consistently bad planning in the city and the poisonous and anti-social modes of transport used". He arrived there on a bicycle and was aware during the attack on him of it lying beside him. He never recovered it.
He told the jury that someone hit him on the head with a baton as he was trying to assist a fellow protester whom he said "one garda seemed to be strangling". This protester was shouting to be let go but the garda was not responding. Mr Leddy said he first appealed to the garda who was holding the protester, but when that did not have any affect, he interceded and came between, them pushing them apart.
At this stage he received a blow to the head. "I remember a sharp pain to my head. I may have lost consciousness or at least been stunned, but the next thing I knew there were gardaí around me and they were continuously striking my head."
His head was bleeding from the blows he received, but it stopped some short time later and he decided not to go to hospital for treatment, as he felt the injury was not serious. A few weeks later he started to suffer with headaches and visited his GP. He had sustained a three- quarter-inch wound to the back of his head and had some bruising on his back and shoulder area.
Some time later, he contacted his solicitor who made a complaint to the Garda Complaints Bureau on his behalf.
The trial continues.