Jailed for spitting at sergeant

A MAN who spat in the face of a garda sergeant and threatened to stab him after being arrested on suspicion of drink driving has been jailed for a total of 13 months.

A court heard that John Finnegan (54), with an address at Rampart View, Virginia, was highly intoxicated and aggressive on the night of a local ladies football team’s victory homecoming in Virginia on November 17, 2024.

Witnesses said they saw Mr Finnegan acting drunk and intimidating after he had crashed his car into another vehicle in a carpark in the town just after 10pm that night.

Cavan District Court heard that after gardaí were alerted to the defendant, Sergeant Jim McDevitt was the first on the scene at the carpark, located to the rear of Matthew’s pub in Virginia.

Sgt McDevitt told the court that he could immediately tell, through the smell of alcohol and his slurring of words, that Mr Finnegan was intoxicated.

The sergeant said the defendant told him that he knew his brother-in-law and pleaded with him not to arrest him.

However he added that John Finnegan soon became very aggressive towards him and spat in his face.

“I didn’t react to it as I didn’t want a physical struggle with him at that stage,” Sgt McDevitt, who had called for back-up, said.

The court heard that after Mr Finnegan was subsequently arrested, he told Sgt McDevitt: “See you Jim, some night on the Main Street, I'll stab you.”

Garda Owen Finn gave evidence to the court that after receiving a call to attend the scene in Virginia, he arrived at the carpark at about 10:30pm on the night in question.

Gda Finn said he too quickly formed the view that John Finnegan had been driving under the influence of alcohol.

He said he arrested Finnegan but it took two sets of handcuffs to get him under control.

The garda said he also witnessed the defendant spit at Sgt McDevitt and threaten to stab him.

Gda Finn added that Mr Finnegan, who had soiled himself and couldn’t be put in a garda patrol car due to that, lay on the ground and would not get up.

He said this meant gardaí were forced to drag him for up to 30 metres to the front of the carpark so that he could be placed in a garda van.

Gda Finn said that Mr Finnegan’s partner, Alice, attempted to drag gardaí off him, and that she was told to back off.

Garda Lorraine McHugh also gave evidence to the court, stating that John Finnegan was highly intoxicated on the night and was resisting arrest.

Gda McHugh said she also witnessed the defendant threatening to stab Sgt McDevitt and that he was threatening in his demeanour towards gardaí.

She added that gardaí were not “overly aggressive” or “overly forceful” in how they dealt with Mr Finnegan.

In his evidence to the court, John Finnegan said he had decided to park his car in a private carpark in Virginia overnight as he was travelling to Dublin by bus the following morning to wave goodbye to his stepdaughter who was leaving for Australia.

Mr Finnegan denied being aggressive towards gardaí and claimed that it was they who were the aggressors.

“The guards kicked the shit out of me and I shit myself,” Mr Finnegan said.

The defendant said that he has been suffering with depression since the incident, adding: “They beat me black and blue and told me they’d kill me.”

However he said he didn’t make any complaint about this as he was suffering from depression.

Mr Finnegan’s wife, Alice, also gave evidence to the court, in which she claimed that gardaí had forced her husband to the ground.

She claimed that Sgt McDevitt was hassling her husband as he was in bad form that night.

Ms Finnegan further claimed that gardaí kicked her husband to the back of the neck while he was on the ground.

She said that, when officers were dragging him to the garda van, she asked if she could talk with him but that a female officer told her to “get the feck away or we will charge you too”.

Ms Finnegan insisted that her husband didn’t make any threats towards Sgt McDevitt.

However in his summing up, Judge Raymond Finnegan said there was no doubt in his mind that both John and Alice Finnegan had got into the witness box and lied.

After defence barrister Hugh Mills, BL, urged Judge Finnegan to show leniency as his client was very remorseful, Judge Finnegan said: “I haven’t seen much remorse from Mr Finnegan or his partner.”

The judge added that another aggravating factor was that the defendant had 16 previous convictions, which included both drink driving and assault.

For the assault on Sgt McDevitt, Judge Finnegan sentenced the defendant to nine months in prison and fined him €500, with six months to pay. On the drink driving offence, he jailed Mr Finnegan for a further four months, to run consecutive to the other sentence, and disqualified him from driving for five years.

He set recognisance in the event of an appeal at €750.

“I want to say thank you to the gardaí for their hard work in very difficult circumstances on that night,” Judge Finnegan added.