Jury begins to consider verdict in civil lawsuit filed by woman alleging she was raped by Conor McGregor – The Irish Times

The Supreme Court jury has begun considering its verdict on a woman’s compensation claim against Conor McGregor for allegedly raping her in a Dublin hotel.

The eight women and four men began deliberating just after 3pm in Nikita Hand’s lawsuit against Mr McGregor, seeking damages for the alleged rape at the Beacon hotel on December 9, 2018.

They will also decide Ms Hand’s civil case against Rafter’s Road resident James Lawrence, 35, in Drimnagh, for allegedly assaulting her after having sex without her consent at the Beacon hotel.

Both men deny the 35-year-old hair colorist’s claims and claim they had consensual sex with Ms Hand separately at the hotel on December 9, 2018.

His Honor Judge Owens began his jury duty late Tuesday and continued from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Wednesday, postponing the trial until Thursday because a juror had a medical appointment.

After summarizing the applicable law and the evidence presented by the witnesses in the case, he concluded his indictment and asked the jury to leave at 3 p.m. They will return to court at 16:00, if they cannot reach a decision they will be sent home and continue their negotiations tomorrow.

He told them to keep in mind that the burden of proof was on Ms. Hand, that the standard of proof was based on the balance of probabilities and that they had to consider all the evidence.

If they came to the stage of assessing compensation based on their finding that one or both men had assaulted Ms Hand, they were entitled to consider the rape to be very serious.

During the trial, which began on November 5 and entered its 11th day on Thursday, the jury heard that Ms Hand and her colleague Danielle Kealey were driven to the hotel with Mr McGregor and Mr Lawrence in Mr McGregor’s car and were brought to the hotel at 12.30pm on the December day. 9th. CCTV showed Mr McGregor leaving with Ms Kealey at around 6.15pm and Ms Hand leaving with Mr Lawrence at around 10.30pm.

Ms Hand and Ms Kealey testified that they had been partying all night and consuming alcohol and cocaine from the evening of Saturday, December 8, until the morning of December 9. Mr McGregor and Mr Lawrence were partying and consuming alcohol separately in Dublin nightclubs. Mr McGregor said cocaine was also present. Mr Lawrence said he had never taken cocaine.

Ms Hand is evidence that she was raped by Mr McGregor and that she has no memory of subsequently having sex with Mr Lawrence.

Mr McGregor denied rape and said he and Ms Hand had “completely consensual”, “vigorous”, “athletic” sex without using a condom. He was later “shocked” when Ms Hand showed him photos of the bruising and said she had not caused it.

Mr Lawrence said he had consensual sex with Ms Hand on two occasions, leaving no marks apart from a small bruise, which did not cause the bruising shown in later photographs.

In their deliberations, the jury must answer yes or no to separate questions about whether Mr. McGregor assaulted Ms. Hand and whether Mr. Lawrence assaulted Ms. Hand.

The judge said it was up to them to decide what evidence to accept and what to reject and whether some witnesses could have been more forthcoming. What you’re dealing with here is “not just truth and lies, but credibility and trustworthiness,” he said.

He said there were “silent witnesses” such as CCTV that they needed to examine closely.

But if they find that one or both men assaulted Ms Hand, they will begin assessing damages in four categories: general damages for the assault; special damages in the form of medical expenses; damages for past and future loss of earnings and aggravated damages.

The judge told them that the purpose of the compensation was to compensate and that compensation was a matter that concerned them.

He said Ms Hand was entitled to more than nominal compensation if they concluded she had been raped by Mr McGregor. The more seriously a person is attacked, the greater the damage.

He said compensation must be appropriate to the harm done and caused, and the jury must act proportionately and fairly in all categories of harm.

He said if they got to the stage of paying compensation, they should forget about things like Mr McGregor being a rich man and Mr Lawrence not.