A man who drank five bottles of Buckfast while watching an Old Firm soccer match was so drunk he cannot remember hurling sectarian abuse at a Catholic woman who was intimidated from her home, a court has heard.
Craigavon Crown Court heard that Adrian Douglas (35) had been watching a Rangers-Celtic match on April 30 last year and a short time later after Rangers were beaten, he was caught on CCTV hammering the door of Danielle Skelton.
Judge Patrick Lynch KC watched the video, captured on the victim’s Ring doorbell camera, several times, where Douglas could be seen staggering towards the door and repeatedly hammering on it and he is heard shouting abuse including “fenians are in here...taigs here”.
Last January, Adrian Douglas admitted intimidation while his older brother Alister Douglas (37) admitted aiding and abetting his brother.
From Carrick Drive and Charles Baron Gardens respectively, they admitted they “unlawfully caused by force, threats or menaces, or in some other way another person namely Danielle Skelton to leave a place where she was for the time being resident or in occupation”.
On Thursday, Crown counsel Nicola Auret conceded the older defendant had “played a somewhat lesser role” in that he banged the door once and did not make any sectarian remarks but she asked the judge to hold that the offences “are aggravated by hostility, aggravated by religion”.
She told the court how Ms Skelton had just put her 18-month-old son to bed and was sitting in her living room watching TV when she heard people “being rowdy” from outside her then home at Ashleigh Crescent.
A short time later she heard banging and shouting coming from her front door and living room window leaving her “terrified and she ran to her bedroom from where she rang her parents and then the police,” said Ms Auret.
The eight minute 999 call was played to the court where Ms Skelton repeatedly pleaded with the operator for police to come to her home, describing how “they’re trying to put my windows in...he’s here hammering my door”.
Ms Skelton’s verbal description to the emergency operator matched what her doorbell camera had captured in that Adrian Douglas was drunk, there were other people around and a woman had tried to coax him away from the door.
Alister Douglas does not make any sectarian comments and is the first of the defendants to walk away but Ms Auret submitted that despite his lesser role “he is clearly assisting and encouraging” his brother.
The brothers were arrested a short time after the incident but both were too drunk to interview until the following day and while Adrian Douglas accepted his behaviour had been “disgusting” and he was ashamed of himself, he claimed not to know the victim is Catholic.
His brother on the other hand, told police “everybody knew she’s Catholic”.
Adrian Douglas’s defence counsel Patrick Taggart conceded that “no right thinking member of society” could ever think his behaviour was acceptable but emphasising that he has Catholic friends and relatives, “he has no history in sectarian abuse, no history of animosity across the religious divide”.
Further contending that “it’s no excuse”, the barrister said the offence had to be seen in the context of the father-of-seven drinking five bottle of Buckfast and being so drunk that he could not remember the incident.
Mr Taggart revealed that Adrian Douglas acts as a full time carer for his long term partner, that some of his children have particular needs while his mother and sister both struggle with MS.
He urged the judge to take an exceptional course when it came to sentencing, arguing that a suspended sentence would meet the justice of the case but would also allow Douglas to continue in his as an important carer for his family.
Defence counsel Conor Coulter said Alister Douglas wanted to repeat again his apologies to the victim and to the court, submitting that he is “rightly ashamed of his behaviour”.
He argued however that given his lesser role, a community based disposal of probation and/or community service would both punish him and allow the self-employed window cleaner to “make some practical reparations to the community”.
Freeing both men on bail, Judge Lynch said he would pass sentence next Thursday.