MCD To Appeal Court Award

Karen McCormack, 27, was left with horrible scarring after trying to leave the park, which was originally designed to keep knights and soldiers out of the grounds during wartime.

McCormack, who lived in County Meath at the time and has since moved to Australia, sued MCD claiming there should have been signs to tell people the Dublin Road gate – where she had entered the park – would be closed after the event.

MCD denied her claims and said she’d contributed to the accident by taking a “prohibited shortcut” and trying to climb a locked gate.

The promoter said she’d passed three main exits before arriving at the Dublin Road gate.

Ms Justice O’Hanlon said McCormack was not “a 5-year-old on a school trip” and there was an issue of contributory negligence in relation to climbing the gate.

However, she also said not putting up signs about the Dublin Road gate being closed was ill-conceived.

There should also have been a person at the entrance to the woodland path leading to the gate and at the gate to alert people, she added.

The judge pointed out that evidence showed 600 security men had been stood down by 11:45 p.m. and it was therefore easy to understand the situation McCormack and her friends found themselves in at 1:30 a.m.

She granted a stay on the payout of the full award providing there was an immediate payout of euro 45,000.