Security man said he heard laughter as he chased two men, court told
Colin O’Sullivan, aged 20, of 19 Highfield Crescent, Kanturk, Co Cork, denied laughing as he ran from the scene and previously pleaded not guilty to a charge of assault causing harm to Ewezina Oprawska at Grenville Place, Cork, on Dec 3, 2011.
Jane Hyland, prosecuting, told Cork Circuit Criminal Court that it was clear from Mr O’Sullivan’s own answers to Garda questions a month later he had been involved in a joint enterprise with another man.
During the interview with Mr O’Sullivan, he said the other man with him had the idea to follow the woman. “He goes, ‘we are going to follow this girl and attack her’.”
When Mr O’Sullivan was asked by gardaí what he thought the other man meant, he replied: “I thought he was going to have sex with her.”
Ms Hyland said the security guard at the Mercy hospital ran after the two men when the woman was struck by the bottle and that as he chased them he heard laughter.
Mr O’Sullivan said yesterday: “There was no laughing by me, and [the other man] was not laughing. He [the security man] could have heard someone else laughing.”
Ms Hyland said: “The security guard was very fair in his evidence. As he ran down the street after ye he heard laughter, so he is lying about that is he?”
Mr O’Sullivan replied: “Yeah.”
“I put it to you that you and [the other man] set out to hunt down this woman,” said Ms Hyland.
Mr O’Sullivan replied: “I don’t go out to hurt people.”
Judge Patrick J Moran will address the jury of six men and five women today.
One of the jurors was discharged yesterday after he became ill shortly before lunchtime. He was taken from the courthouse in an ambulance.
