High Court number 24 is one of the most easily accessible courtrooms in the Four Courts complex, with a separate entrance on Chancery Street, almost opposite the Legal Eagle pub.
It's a large, old fashioned, courtroom with a substantial public gallery above it, accessed via a staircase.
It is a place where there is rarely "standing room only" but Conor McGregor’s celebrity status has drawn more than the usual number of court spectators.
On many days during the past week, the public gallery was full, with people standing in the alcoves, sometimes hanging down over the edge of the gallery, hoping to catch a glimpse of the parties.
It’s something Mr Justice Alexander Owens had clearly been thinking about, even before the jurors in this high-profile case, raised their own concerns that someone had been filming them.
The judge said filming the jury was completely inappropriate and in contempt of court. And he said when he looked up at the gallery, it had struck him that only those able to find seats should be there.
There was no obligation on the court he said, to provide accommodation for everyone.
Evidence and cross examination
For most of the week, the jury and the crowds in the courtroom have listened to the evidence and the cross examination of 35-year-old hairdresser, Nikita Hand.
Ms Hand has sued Mr McGregor and his friend James Lawrence, accusing them of sexual assault in the Beacon Hotel in Dublin on 9 December 2018.
In Mr McGregor’s case she alleges he choked her three times before raping her, leaving her "black and blue".
Mr Lawrence is in the case, the court heard, because of his own statement to gardaí that he had sex with Ms Hand twice on the same day, something Ms Hand said she has no recollection of and which she said Mr Lawrence is "absolutely" lying about.
The men deny Ms Hand’s claims and say they had consensual sex with her.
Injuries
Gynaecologist, Dr Daniel Kane was the first witness in the case. He gave evidence of examining Ms Hand at the Sexual Assault Treatment Unit in the Rotunda Hospital on the morning of Monday 10 December 2018.
He told the court Ms Hand had said she was physically and sexually assaulted by a man and was concerned about a tampon which was still inside her. She told the doctor she wanted a forensic examination with gardaí involved.
Dr Kane said when he examined her, he found the tampon "wedged, at the very, very top of the vagina," and it had to be removed using a forceps.
He also said there were abrasions and bruises to Ms Hand’s neck, hands and arms, some of her acrylic nails were missing and there was bruising on her knees, thighs and back.
There was also a bruise and a scratch on her right breast. The doctor said he would categorise her injuries as moderate to severe.
Dr Kane said he had conducted more than 300 examinations of women, but this was the only time he had encountered a retained tampon after sexual intercourse.
Beer, Bacardi, cocaine
Ms Hand began her own evidence on Tuesday afternoon.
She described going to her work Christmas party on 8 December 2018, beginning at the hair salon where she worked beside the Goat pub. She drank beer and Bacardi and also took cocaine.
While she was out, the court heard, she uploaded a photograph of herself to her Instagram story and selected Mr McGregor as one of those who could view the story.
The court heard he commented, asking where she was.
She and some work colleagues returned to the salon to continue the party. While there, the court was told she contacted Mr McGregor who arrived some time later with a driver and collected Ms Hand with another colleague, Danielle Kealy.
The court was told they drove around for a number of hours, collecting James Lawrence and some cocaine, which Ms Hand said she and Ms Kealy both took.
They then arrived at the Beacon Hotel in Sandyford and went up to the hotel’s penthouse suite.
Ms Hand told the court she was under the impression that they were actually in the Morgan Hotel in Temple Bar as the décor was the same.
Ms Hand said she did not go to the hotel for sex but to party and have a good time. She said she and Ms Kealy ended up at a different kind of party to the one they were expecting.
The alleged rape
Ms Hand became extremely emotional and upset as she described the alleged rape itself.
She told the court that Mr McGregor was coming on to her and she had tried to talk him out of what he was doing, saying she knew his partner Dee’s family.
However, she said Mr McGregor pinned her down to the bed in one of the suite’s bedrooms and pressed his body weight on top of her.
She said she couldn’t move or breathe and the more she struggled, the more he liked it, telling her: "Go on, I like that".
Her hands shook and she sobbed as she gave her evidence. She told her Senior Counsel, Ray Boland, that she was trying her best but that she was struggling and finding it really hard.
Ms Hand said she bit Mr McGregor and that he did not like it.
She added that he went behind her, put his arm around her neck and choked her three times. She froze, she said, thinking she was going to die and that she would never see her daughter again.
After that, she said she just "let him do whatever he needed to do" in order to survive.
She said he was aggressive with her, pulling her clothes and pushing her head down towards his penis and that he then raped her.
Ms Hand said as she started getting dressed, Mr McGregor told her to lie down with him for a few minutes. She said she did so and fell asleep.
What happened after that was the subject of much of the questioning and cross examination of Ms Hand.
Aftermath
She told the court she woke in a panic and texted her boyfriend that she was having a great time so that he would not worry about her.
Everyone decided to leave she said, and she was confused.
Ms Hand told the court that they all went down to the car park, but she and James Lawrence went back up to the room and it was only at that stage that she saw the bruises on her arms and the reality of what had happened hit her.
She said she asked Mr Lawrence did they "all put a blind eye to what Conor does to women". She also described being upset and crying and said Mr Lawrence got her food and drink and told her to relax.
The next thing she remembered was waking up in a taxi. She went to her friend’s house before going home to her boyfriend.
The jurors watched a 45-minute compilation of CCTV footage beginning when Ms Kealy and Ms Hand were collected in the carpark of the Goat pub at around 10.14am.
Around two hours later they arrived at the Beacon Hotel. Much of the footage involved clips taken from inside the lift at the hotel and the area just outside the lift in the car park.
At around 6.15pm, the footage shows Mr McGregor and Ms Kealy leaving and Mr Lawrence and Ms Hand going back into the lift.
The footage then shows both of them going in and out of the lift on numerous occasions.
They are barefoot, and at some points, Ms Hand is hugging Mr Lawrence and kissing him on the cheek. The interactions at the lift and the car park continue for about an hour.
Ms Hand became extremely upset while the CCTV was shown, telling the court it was really hard for her to watch because she couldn’t remember anything.
Questioned by Mr McGregor’s lawyer, Remy Farrell, she said the footage was "deeply disturbing". It was not her character she said. She was drunk and vulnerable and should have been taken home.
Mr Farrell suggested the reason she didn’t want to watch the footage was because it "flatly contradicted" the story she had told. Ms Hand said she was brutally raped and battered and the CCTV did not take away what happened to her.
She described Mr Farrell’s suggestion that she was an enthusiastic participant in sex with Mr McGregor as a "made up story".
Ms Hand said she woke up later that evening in a taxi and decided to go to her friend Emer Brennan’s house after texting her that she had been out with Mr McGregor and that she had been raped and left "black and blue".
The court heard Ms Brennan took photographs of her injuries but later deleted them amid panic about social media coverage of the incident.
Recorded conversation
Mr Farrell played a conversation to Ms Hand, recorded by her boyfriend when she eventually returned home in the early hours of the morning.
She is clearly upset and crying on the recording and her boyfriend tells her she is obviously very drunk. She tells her boyfriend that she was raped but refuses to say by whom.
Ms Hand said the person who raped her had told her he’d kill her. Under cross examination, she told Mr Farrell she didn’t remember if this was something that had happened.
Ms Hand crouched low in the witness box, put her head in her hands and sobbed loudly as the recording was played.
She admitted to Mr Farrell that she had lied to her boyfriend during the conversation about where she had been and who she was with.
However, she insisted, lying to her boyfriend was not a crime while what happened to her was.
'Absolutely lying’
Ms Hand was also cross examined by senior counsel John Fitzgerald for Mr Lawrence. She told him that Mr Lawrence was absolutely lying about having sex with her twice that evening.
When Mr Fitzgerald put it to her that she did not fall asleep after the alleged rape but was instead being affectionate with Mr McGregor, had sex with him again and could be heard having a good time, Ms Hand said it was another "made up story".
Mr Fitzgerald said her demeanour on the CCTV footage did not look like someone who was distressed at being violently raped earlier that day.
Ms Hand said she looked very, very drunk and did not remember the events on the footage at all.
She was also shown photographs of the outfit she was wearing and said damage to her underwear and her jumpsuit was caused by Mr McGregor pulling at her aggressively.
Afraid for herself and her family
The week’s final witness was a garda who spoke to Ms Hand the next day in hospital. His notes record that she would not name the man who raped her saying she was afraid for herself and her family.
She initially said she would not be pressing charges but eventually made a statement to gardaí in early January.
She told the court she was absolutely devastated and felt let down when informed that the Director of Public Prosecutions would not be prosecuting either Mr McGregor or Mr Lawrence.
The jury of eight women and four men has been told they are the judges of fact and will have to draw a conclusion about what happened.
The case is due to resume again on Tuesday.
