Jury awards man €30k after late-night bar assault by bouncer

A HIGH Court jury has awarded €30,000 to a man whose eye socket was fractured when a security man at a late-night bar punched him in the face.

Christopher Gillen (32), a plumber and father-of-two from Montpellier Park, Stoneybatter, Dublin, sued Anne Marie Murray, trading as Fibber Magees bar and nightclub and the Gate Hotel in Parnell Street, Dublin, where the incident occurred on September 19, 2012.
The court heard Mr Gillen had been at Fibbers and was waiting for his girlfriend, now fianceé, who went to the toilet just before they left at closing time.

Mr Gillen still had an almost full pint of beer and the bouncer, Petru Selchin, wanted him to hand over the glass before going outside but Mr Gillen wanted to drink it in the porch area before he left. The row continued out in the street where glass was taken out of his hand and an altercation occurred in the porch area of the bar.
Mr Gillen claimed Mr Selchin struck him in the face at this point causing a blow-out fracture of the right orbit around his eye. While he required hospital treatment and was out of work for sometime, he has made a full recovery.

The defendants denied assault and claimed he was only pushed by Mr Selchin out of the doorway of the pub when he tried to get back in after the glass was taken from him. They also claimed he was struck by his girlfriend in the face while they were out in the street afterwards, not by the bouncer.
The jury found, after deliberating for around an hour and a half, Mr Selchin did punch him causing the fracture.

It assessed compensatory and aggravated damages at €30,000.
Mr Justice Colm MacEochaidh thanked the members of the jury and discharged them. He also added pre-hearing agreed damages for loss of earnings and other matters which brought the total award to €31,167.

Costs will be decided at a later hearing.