Conor McGregor subjected a woman to a “savage” assault in a Dublin hotel and is a “devious coward” who does not have “the decency” to own up to what he did, a High Court jury has been told.
There is no shortage of irrefutable evidence that Nikita Hand was held in a “stranglehold” by Mr McGregor after which she “basically surrendered” to him in the Beacon Hotel on December 9th, 2018, senior counsel John Gordon said.
The stranglehold was central to Mr McGregor taking “control” of her and was embedded in her memory for the rest of her days, he said
Ms Hand had called medical evidence, including from a paramedic who described the bruising on her body as one of the worst cases she had seen, he said. Another doctor who examined her in the Rotunda hospital sexual assault unit the day after the alleged assault said hers was one of the worst cases he had seen and he had never had to deal with a case before where a tampon was wedged into a woman’s vagina.
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“Somebody did it, it happened in the Beacon Hotel, it is Mr McGregor,” Mr Gordon said.
Mr McGregor had subjected her to a violent assault and then tried to “run away” from that by suggesting her injuries were possibly caused by someone else or were due to her taking a “swan-dive” into a bath in the hotel or being out partying for a few days, counsel said.
The “more lies”, the “more extravagant and outrageous” Mr McGregor’s case becomes and all this underlines that the jury should vindicate and compensate Ms Hand. “You can figure out fact from fiction,” he said.
Ms Hand “has to live with this for the rest of her days and will always be a marked woman because she stood up to Conor McGregor”, he said.
The jury, he urged, should find Ms Hand was assaulted by Mr McGregor and should award damages, including exemplary damages.
Counsel also said the jury can assume that James Lawrence, who Ms Hand has also sued, was in “cahoots” with Mr McGregor.
Mr Lawrence had come forward with a statement after Mr McGregor was interviewed in January 2019 by gardaí about Ms Hand’s allegation she was raped by Mr McGregor, counsel said. Mr Lawrence had said he went to solicitors within two or three days of the alleged assault, the same solicitor as Mr McGregor. The jury heard Mr McGregor had paid all his legal fees, counsel said.
“So we may assume that Mr Lawrence was in cahoots with Mr McGregor from the word go,” he said. Mr Lawrence had “dropped in a hand grenade” saying he had sex with Ms Hand too in the hotel, he had said in his statement he had “soft” sex.
The word “soft” was thrown in to distance Mr Lawrence from the fact Ms Hand had been badly beaten up and to confuse the narrative, to make her out to be an “even bigger hussey”, Mr Gordon said.
He was making closing arguments on behalf of Ms Hand at the close of her civil action for damages against Mr McGregor and Mr Lawrence, of Rafter’s Road, Drimnagh, over alleged sexual assaults of her at the hotel.
Both men have denied her claims and have given evidence they had consensual sex with Ms Hand.
Closing speeches on behalf of both men were made on Tuesday after which Mr Gordon closed the case for Ms Hand. Mr Justice Alexander Owens then began charging the jury on the law and will continue his charge on Wednesday.
In his speech, Mr Gordon told the jury they had seen a lot over the eight days of evidence, a lot of “distress”, “anger”, “vitriol” and “serial lying”.
He said Mr McGregor’s counsel, Remy Farrell, had urged the jury to focus on “islands” of evidence in the case, including CCTV evidence.
That refers to bits of evidence considered absolutely irrefutable around which the jury will construct its consideration of the overall case, Mr Gordon said.
He said that Mr Farrell had pointed to CCTV evidence but while cameras do not lie, they do not always tell the whole story either.
He suggested, using their common sense, it would be clear to the jury that Ms Hand was “not in good shape” in the hotel.
There is “a rock” sitting in the middle of the case which both respondents sail around, he said. The rock is, that on the evening of December 9th, 2018, Ms Hand was badly beaten up and the best Mr McGregor’s side can come up with is there are inconsistencies and lies in relation to her account to her then partner, he said.
Mr McGregor initially seemed to be making the case that this was just fun, “athletic” sex but he had changed his story and had given evidence including there was no tampon, he said. There was “even a little trip into the possibility of a third man”.
Mr McGregor had obviously thought, as the case approached, there was going to be a problem over the tampon and the severity of Ms Hand’s injuries.
Counsel referred to Ms Hand’s first interview to gardaí on January 5th, 2019 and said she gave a further interview in February after becoming aware, for the first time, that Mr Lawrence was saying she had had sex with him.
In the interim, Mr McGregor had interviews with gardaí and during that time much of the CCTV and photos of her injuries were all shown to him, counsel said.
In an interview on January 18th, 2019, Mr McGregor gave a statement saying he was shocked at the injuries, he had not caused them and he speculated that someone else had done so. It was at that point that Mr McGregor, “for the first time, had to face to up what he had done because he did it and what he did was savage”, he said.
Having given “bland” evidence for some time, at one point “the mask slipped, he lost his temper” and the court witnessed “a stream of invective” directed across the courtroom to Ms Hand. “What does that say about Mr McGregor?” he asked.
The jury, in making its decision, looks at evidence and makes an assessment of the demeanour of witnesses and how they answer questions, he said.
Ms Hand said in her evidence she would not have sex during her period and would not have sex with a tampon in and the balance of probabilities applied, counsel said.
She had said Mr McGregor “wouldn’t take no for an answer”.
Mr McGregor had got her to the hotel, booked some hours earlier by his driver at a time when he was in Krystle nightclub with friends, including two girls. The club went on until about 7am, the girls decided to go home and he drove one of them to Clontarf.
“So here he was at 7.30am, the suite booked but no girls.”
That was why Ms Hand said she was surprised to hear from Mr McGregor so late, counsel said. “That was because she was not in the original plan, she was the substitute.”
The jury could reasonably infer it was his intention to have sex and his protestations about sometimes staying over in hotels to rest and perhaps go to their gym was “risible, nonsense, absolute poppycock”.
“Thank goodness the jury have the common sense to realise they are being sold a pup by this arrogant man.”
Surrounding the basic facts is a litany of corroborative and professional evidence all of which confirm Ms Hand’s story and what has happened to her and the effects it has had on her, he said.
Her GP had no doubt she had suffered post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and an experienced vocational assessor said she could not go back to the work she had done.
Dr Ann Leader, one of the country’s most prominent psychiatrists involved in more than 5,000 cases, had said Ms Hand suffered PTSD. The cause of PTSD, a violent assault, had not been challenged in court.
Mr Lawrence seemed to have bought into Mr McGregor’s case there was no tampon, he said. Mr McGregor had made a cornerstone of his evidence there was no tampon and that has to be a lie, counsel said.
“Rather than calling Ms Hand a liar, the liar is Mr McGregor who does not have the courage, the decency to own up to what he did,” he said. “This is the man who lives by the media, who thrives by the media, if he was a man at all he would apologise to my client for what he did to her. He is not a man, he is a coward, a devious coward, and you should treat him as what he is.”
There is plenty of corroborative evidence Mr McGregor put her in a stranglehold and that she, having basically surrendered, was told by him “now you know how I felt in the Octagon”, counsel said.
Mr McGregor had agreed that, two months earlier he was beaten by his opponent putting him in a stranglehold and he had to tap out to surrender and lose the fight, counsel said.
“You can imagine what was going through Mr McGregor’s mind when he said that, he was in some temper and he was taking it out on her come hell or high water,” counsel said. The idea she had made up this story a matter of hours later was preposterous.
Of course Ms Hand’s story was “all over the place”, she was in a terrible state and suffering from a fragmented memory, he said.
Whatever the jury thinks about Ms Hand’s social habits, “the one thing you know is that she has courage”, he said.
Ms Hand was bitterly disappointed when the DPP decided not to prosecute over her complaints but she made no criticism of the DPP. This case involved an entirely different process, but the jury will understand why she was disappointed.
It was only after that decision that she instructed solicitors to bring this case. This was and remains her only avenue to vindication.
Mr McGregor’s side had argued it was not about vindication but about compensation but that is wrong, he said.
The abuse did not just happen in the hotel, it is continuing, he said.
Earlier the jury were urged to decide the case on the evidence, and not on whether they may “love” or “loathe” Mr McGregor.
It is “absolutely vital” they give a verdict in accordance with the evidence, not their gut reaction or feelings or because they may not like Mr McGregor, Remy Farrell SC said in his closing speech on behalf of Mr McGregor.
Mr Farrell said Mr McGregor is someone who is “hard to avoid”, “who elicits strong views, some love him, some do not love him”.
The case is also not about “vindication”, he said. The jury had been told about the DPP’s decision not to prosecute and there was a suggestion the court was the only place she can get vindication, he said. The DPP’s view does not matter and nor does anyone else’s view, he said.
Ms Hand, he said, had told “persistent” lies and “absolute untruths” about several matters before, during and after the events in the Beacon hotel, he said.
Perhaps the single most important lie was evident from a text sent by Ms Hand at 6.28pm, after the alleged rape, to her boyfriend, saying “all great, I’m so drunk ...”, he said.
Closing the case for Mr Lawrence this afternoon, John Fitzgerald SC said many features of Mr McGregor’s case overlapped with his client’s.
One important difference was Mr McGregor was well-known, he said.
Mr Lawrence is here with none of the fame, perhaps even notoriety, of Mr McGregor. Mr Lawrence has lived his 35 years “in relative obscurity”, which he would probably like to return to after this case.
Mr Lawrence is entitled to be treated equally to Mr McGregor in that neither should be tried on the basis of what they are or about how the jury may feel about sexual assault cases, cocaine use, people cheating on their partners and going out for 36 hour benders, he said. They must decide the case on the evidence.
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