An east Clare farmer has been cleared in court of trespassing on the lands of his ex-wife’s new boyfriend to commit an offence or to interfere with the man’s cattle trough.
At Gort District Court, Judge Marian O’Leary dismissed the case against Padraig O’Brien (49) of Prospect House, Scariff, Co. Clare due to a defective summons.
Padraig O’Brien was contesting a charge that on October 25, 2022 at Loughinwadda, Peterswell, Co. Galway, he was within the vicinity of the curtilage of the dwelling and farm yard of Sean Burke for the purpose of trespassing and giving rise to a reasonable inference that he was there to commit an offence or to unlawfully interfere with property.
O’Brien’s solicitor, Jim Nash successfully argued that the cattle trough that his client was accused of interfering with was in a field on Sean Burke’s farm and not within the vicinity of the curtilage of the dwelling and farm yard.
Judge O’Leary agreed with the solicitor and dismissed the charge against Padraig O’Brien.
Court
At garda interview in November 2022 after Sean Burke had made a formal statement about Padraig O’Brien allegedly trespassing on his lands, Padraig O’Brien alleged that he “discovered that his wife was having an affair with Sean Burke of Peterswell” in April of that year.
Padraig O’Brien told the garda that “the whole ordeal was a nightmare”. He said that his ex-wife “tried to say that I tried to poison horses up in Peterswell”.
In evidence, Garda Dara Melia told the court that Sean Burke is now in a relationship with Padraig O’Brien’s ex-partner “and that is what he believes is the reason for Padraig O’Brien’s attitude towards him”.
Sean Burke said that on October 25, 2022, an eye witness, Patrick O’Neill described the person at his water trough “and I immediately knew who it was”.
In evidence, the eye witness said that it looked like Padraig O’Brien “was interfering with the tank – it didn’t look right. It didn’t really make sense”.
Padraig O’Brien told gardaí that he did enter the lands to take water from the trough for his overheating car.
Sean Burke said: “I returned to the lands and thankfully cattle had not gone anywhere near that trough… I removed cattle from the field and I haven’t let cattle into that field since.”
He added that he removed a couple of bottles of water from the trough “in the hope that it would be sampled but because it was animals concerned and not people, the gardaí don’t provide a facility to test the water”.
Sean Burke said that around six months later he decommissioned the water trough and found an acid battery at the bottom of the trough and added that he no longer uses the field for stock. “I have enough acres,” he said.