Publican ‘rugby tackled’ man with plastic toy gun

A LIMERICK publican used his experience as a rugby player to crash tackle a man who burst into his crowded bar and threatened him with what turned out to be a toy gun.

Donal Mulcahy, who owns Rashers bar in Upper Gerald Griffin Street, told a District Court hearing that he feared for his life and that his hands and legs were shaking as Kieran Dunne pointed what appeared to be a real gun at him.

He said he grabbed a baseball bat and chased Dunne out the door, catching up with him as he was about to get up on his push bike to make a getaway.

“He still had the gun and I rugby tackled him on the ground after he dropped his guard to get up on the bike. I am fast and played rugby all my life.”

He said it was only then he realised the gun Dunne was carrying was plastic.

Dunne, of 5 Colbert Park, Janesboro, Limerick, admitted kicking the door of the pub open and that he had a toy gun in his hand.

He claimed that after chasing him, Mulcahy hit him 10 or 12 times with the baton and he went to the regional hospital. Dunne denied he had a hoodie pulled over his head.

Mulcahy said that when Dunne burst into the bar pointing what appeared to be a real gun at him, he instinctively grabbed a baseball bat to protect himself, his staff and his customers.

“I was afraid for my life,” he said.

Mr Mulcahy denied hitting Dunne with the bat. He said: “If I hit him three or four times with the bat it would have killed him. I did not touch him with it. I am not that type of person.”

Garda Micheal O’Gorman said he went to the scene having been told there was an incident with a firearm. He said that after a period searching, he came upon Dunne in another street and he had a cut on his head. An ambulance took Dunne to hospital.

Garda O’Gorman said they were unable to get a medical report on Dunne from the hospital.

Dunne was charged with using threatening and abusive behaviour in the bar and Mulcahy was charged with assaulting Dunne.

Judge Tom O’Donnell said that for Dunne to walk into a bar even with a toy gun was an act of absolute and utter madness.

He said Mulcahy’s action of taking a wooden bat and chasing Dunne out was an act of madness as well.

He dismissed both charges against the two men, saying the case had not been proved in either instance beyond reasonable doubt.