Drug dealer videoed himself hitting man with guitar over €50 drug debt

Two men set up a video camera in another man’s house to record themselves breaking a guitar over his head over a €50 drug debt.

Judge Seán Ó Donnabháin sentenced one of them to six years in jail, with the last four years suspended on condition that he leave the country on completion of the two years in prison.

Garda Pauline Reid said she met the accused, Rytis Matelis, a Lithuanian, in Skibbereen later that day and he had the camera in his pocket with the video of the attack.

Matelis told Gda Reid it was not a €50 debt, and it was actually for €500.

Judge Ó Donnabháin asked: “Was he looking for sympathy from the guards for the fact that he was owed money for drugs?

“Presumably he wanted to show it [the video] to others, maybe to get the benefit of enforcement without having to get his hands dirty again. This man’s behaviour was totally outrageous and unacceptable in any man’s language.”

Matelis pleaded guilty to assault causing harm to Adkadiusz Cydzik and falsely imprisoning him at his own home for the assault.

He also admitted five counts of having drugs for sale or supply at his address at Rossa Rd, Skibbereen, last September. The judge described it as “a veritable hypermarché of drugs”.

Detective Sergeant Fergal Foley said Matelis had over 11,000 smuggled cigarettes at his home in Skibbereen and a variety of illegal drugs for sale or supply on September 3, 2013. The drugs included having cannabis and different kinds of amphetamines.

Defence barrister Peter O’Flynn said Matelis realised there would be a jail term but if any portion of it could be suspended, he would undertake to return to Lithuania, where he has a partner and child and supportive parents.