Man assaulted on own doorstep had to wait over an hour for garda help in Cork

A middleaged man from Cork has been left battered and bruised after drunken young people assaulted him on his own doorstep this weekend, repeatedly kicking him in the head and eventually leaving him in a pool of his own blood.

Adding insult to his injury, John Handelaar said he waited for more than an hour for gardaí to respond to the incident, by which time his assailants were long gone.

Mr Handlelaar, who has been living on Gilabbey Street for the last eight years, was at home with his wife, Sabrina Dent, when they were disturbed by a group of young adults congregating outside their house at around 3.30am on Saturday morning.

“Living where I’m living, I have to go out and tell drunk students to move on maybe a couple of hundred times a year,” he said.

“This time I went out and they got highly aggressive. One of them tried to rush the front door and I slipped and fell. Then they started kicking me while I was on the ground,” he said.

The attack lasted for a couple of minutes, though Mr Handlelaar said it felt like longer, and only ended when his assailant realised Mr Handelaar’s wife had called the gardaí.

“It stopped when the third guy saw Sabrina on the phone. Then they legged it up the street. The guards didn’t come when we needed them so they’re in the wind now and will never be caught,” he said.

Ms Dent said she heard shouts from outside and went to see what was happening. She saw one attacker sitting on her husband and another kicking him in the head. “I went back into the house and I picked up the phone and dialled 999. I said we needed gardaí immediately because there was an assault in progress,” she said.

“I placed two additional calls to 999 to find out where they were and after the students ran away my husband placed a fourth call and they hung up on him.

“There was blood pouring off his head and onto the floor. He was saying ‘I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine’ and I was saying you’re not fine, you just got kicked in the head.”

After 40 minutes, Ms Dent called a taxi and brought Mr Handelaar to the Mercy Hospital.

Gardaí met the pair at the hospital more than an hour after Ms Dent’s call.

I called 999 at 3:30 am with an assault IN PROGRESS. We did not see two very overworked Gardaí until 4:40 am. https://t.co/v4R9iNJyKL

— Sabrina Dent (@SabrinaDent) December 19, 2015

“Two gardaí showed up but they were primarily concerned with telling me why they didn’t come earlier. Then we had to schedule a date to come in and give written statements and they told us it would be December 28 before we could do that,” said Mr Handelaar.

Mr Handelaar voiced his frustration on Twitter and, as a result, was contacted by Defence Minister Simon Coveney, and TDs Jerry Buttimer and Michael McGrath.

“I don’t know why you didn’t get assistance from gardaí after a serious assault. Hope you are recovering and understand your annoyance,” wrote the minister, while Mr Buttimer said the response time was “totally inadequate” and said he would be raising the issue with the gardaí today.

A Garda spokesperson confirmed they are investigating an assault that took place on a man in his 40s at Gilabbey Street in the early hours of Saturday morning.