INDEPENDENT BY-ELECTION CANDIDATE John McDermott has made an official complaint to gardaí over an incident in which he was manhandled by Frank Feighan TD.
The incident happened at about 4.30pm on Friday evening as Taoiseach Enda Kenny was arriving in Roscommon Town.
Frank Feighan was filmed by RTÉ News pushing into hospital campaigner McDermott as he approached the Taoiseach’s car on Main Street.
Gardaí say they do not comment on individual cases but have confirmed that they are investigating a minor assault.
McDermott said that he made the complaint to at Roscommon Garda Station yesterday evening after giving Feighan 24 hours to apologise to him directly.
Feighan issued a statement yesterday evening in which he said he regretted “if any actions of mine caused hurt to anybody”.
McDerrmott told TheJournal.ie that he has not spoken to the Feighan since the incident.
“I gave him the opportunity to apologise to me,” he said.
“I wasn’t going to go to the gardaí if he apologised to me and I gave him the opportunity to do so. I’ve made the statement and now it’s out of my hands.”
McDermott said that he spent about 20 minutes giving his statement to gardaí who told him they will examine footage of the incident.
McDermott, who is a member of the Roscommon Hospital Action Committee, says that he believes that Feighan knew it was him was standing behind him because he was asking a question of the Taoiseach.
He said he was asking the question,
“Would he tell the people in Roscommon why he reneged on promises he made in 2011 not to close the A&E unit in Roscommon Hospital?”
Attempts were made to contact Frank Feighan TD for this article.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
have your say