Mixed martial arts star Conor McGregor has described as “lies” and “more lies” the account given by Nikita Hand of her alleged rape by him in a Dublin hotel six years ago.
He told the High Court they had “fully consensual”, “enthusiastic” and “athletic” sex and that Ms Hand had not shown “one iota of distress”.
McGregor (36) insisted he did not cause any of the extensive bruising documented on Ms Hand’s body in the aftermath of the alleged rape in a Dublin hotel in December 2018.
“I tell you where she didn’t get them from. She didn’t get them from me,” he told Ms Hand’s counsel John Gordon SC.
McGregor said he had been “shocked” when he first saw photos of the bruises.
He claimed the sex was “physical” but “not rough in any way”.
The UFC fighter finally took to the stand today, the sixth day of Ms Hand’s civil action against him and his associate James Lawrence.
Mother of one Hand (35), a hair colourist from Drimnagh in Dublin, is seeking damages, claiming she was raped by both men in a penthouse suite at the Beacon Hotel in Sandyford on Sunday, December 9, 2018.
She and a work colleague, Danielle Kealey, had gone to the hotel with McGregor and Lawrence, of Rafters Road, Drimnagh, the morning after their work Christmas party.
Both men deny her claims and say they each twice had consensual sex with her that day.
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Under cross examination from Mr Gordon, McGregor denied her claims that he had choked her and violently raped her at the hotel.
Asked to explain the bruising, McGregor claimed Ms Hand had “swan dived” into the bath of the penthouse suite and that a sexual assault treatment unit doctor had described marks on her neck as “consistent with a love bite”.
He also suggested the bruising could have been the result of Ms Hand being “out three days”, a reference to her Christmas party, which spilled into the following day.
“The sex with me was physical. It was athletic. It was in a multitude of positions. During some of these positions I had my hands on her hips, I had my hands on her buttocks, I had my hands on the back of her legs,” he told a jury of eight women and four men.
“At no time did I have anything around her neck. At no time did I go near her arms.
“At no time did she bite me. At no time did she scrape me. At no time time did I scrape her.”
Ms Hand testified last week that she bit McGregor while attempting to fight off his advances and that a large scrape on her breast was caused by her watch when she struggled as he pressed down on her.
She also claimed that while McGregor had her pinned down, he told her: “That’s how I felt when I was in the Octagon when I had to tap myself out three times.”
Asked about this comment, McGregor said it was not in his nature to say something like that.
“It is a lie. In my head it is almost a fantasy. It feels like a fantasy,” he said.
McGregor also denied that Ms Hand was wearing a tampon.
“In broad daylight, there was no tampon. Not from what I could see. Not from what I could feel,” he said.
The court heard last week how a forceps had to be used to remove a tampon from Ms Hand’s vagina at the Sexual Assault Treatment Unit of the Rotunda Hospital.
At one point McGregor told Mr Gordon: “Your client is full of lies. Everything is a lie.”
Earlier, McGregor was brought through the events of that weekend by his counsel Remy Farrell SC.
He said he had gone from his then home at Ladycastle in the K Club on the night of Saturday, December 8 to a nightclub called District 8 in the Tivoli Theatre. The car was driven by one of his security team.
Among friends who were there with him there was Lawrence, someone he had known since he was a teenager and bonded with over games of Call of Duty.
He stayed there between 11pm and 1am before he and a group of friends went driving around the city to see where they would go next. According to McGregor, they ended up in Krystle nightclub from some time between 2am and 2.30am until around 6am or 7am.
He said he ordered drinks and “as the evening got later there was a bit of cocaine produced”.
McGregor said that on leaving the nightclub he went back to his car. He had arranged for a room in the Beacon Hotel to be booked for him. The friends he was with, including Lawrence, had dispersed.
Throughout the night he had been in contact with Ms Hand on Instagram. She was someone he knew of from the Dublin 12 area who moved in the same some social circles.
She had contacted him after he posted a photo of himself in District 8. She had posted a photo of herself wearing a red jumpsuit. “I liked it,” he said.
“There was a slew of messages coming through to me from Nikita,” he continued.
“A little later it was ‘come out and get us’, things of that nature.”
Ms Hand has testified she wanted to continue partying after her Christmas party with colleagues had wound down at the salon in the early hours of the morning.
McGregor said at that stage of the morning he was unsure what he was going to do. He said he thought he was going to Ms Hand’s party but she and Ms Kealey got into the car when he arrived at the salon.
“I knew of Nikita but I didn’t really know her. I didn’t know Danielle at all,” he said.
He described Ms Hand as “a bit bombastic and energetic” when she got into the car.
He didn’t know if he wanted to bring the women back to his hotel suite, and at one point decided he would go home and drop them off but “Nikita said no”.
McGregor said he decided to collect Lawrence from his home.
“I had two girls. Two boisterous ladies full of energy. I needed to level it out,” he said.
“I knew Nikita knew James, so I thought it was perfect.”
He said Lawrence was reluctant to join them but he persuaded him.
“I end up going into the house. ‘James, I have two lucky ladies here. They are asking for you’,” McGregor said he told him.
He described the mood in the car as “very fun, very happy, full of energy”.
The group arrived at the hotel around noon and McGregor sent his security men to get keycards for the penthouse suite.
He said it consisted of two rooms, a bedroom and a sitting room, and that the door between them was “open at all times”.
McGregor said vodka, Bacardi and beer was ordered up to the room and some music was put on.
Asked by Mr Farrell if there was chat, McGregor said: “That’s what there was, a bit of music a bit of drink, getting to know each other.”
He said that at one point a fully clothed Ms Hand had jumped into the bath in the suite with a “thud” and that when he went to see if she was alright, “she tried to play it off by pretending to swim”.
He said while he thought that was strange, he found it amusing.
McGregor said that while they were in the living room, they “started getting a bit more closer and having a buzz”.
“We were kissing and whatnot,” he said.
McGregor said he got up to go into the bathroom and that Ms Hand followed him.
“We began kissing and it became a lot more passionate and it took off from there,” he claimed.
McGregor claimed Ms Hand performed oral sex on him and that things “progressed very quickly” and “went on for a bit”.
He described the intercourse in significant detail, saying it took place on a bed and involved various positions.
McGregor claimed Ms Kealey and Lawrence were “literally three feet away” on a sofa bed in the other room and that they too started having sex.
He claimed he and Ms Hand had sex for an hour and a half, slept for a few hours and then had sex again.
He also claimed that when he decided to leave, Ms Hand tried to keep the door of his car open, grabbed him by the arm and said: “Stay, stay, stay.”
McGregor said that when news emerged soon afterwards that a sports star was being investigated for an alleged rape, he initially didn’t think it was a reference to him.
But then rumours intensified that it was him.
“I was completely shocked and frightened beyond belief,” he said.
“The most scary thing I had gone through in my life at that time.”
Earlier, Ms Kealey gave evidence of her recollection of events.
Asked by Mr Farrell how McGregor and Ms Hand and were when they emerged from the bedroom, she said: “They came back out and everything was fine.”
Ms Kealey continued: “Everything was fine. No one was in bad form or anything. I didn’t know anything bad had happened.”
She was giving evidence as a defence witness in the civil action.
Ms Kealey gave evidence that she and Ms Hand worked for the same hair salon business at the time, but in different salons. She worked in Naas, while Ms Hand worked in Goatstown, Dublin.
Ms Kealey said she did not know Ms Hand well as she had not met her very often, only at training days.
Both women were at a staff Christmas party on December 8, 2018 which took in a winter circus at Airfield in Dundrum, the Goat Bar and Grill in Goatstown and then continued in the Goatstown salon itself into the early hours of the morning.
Ms Kealy said it was “not until the end of the night” that she first heard Conor McGregor’s name being mentioned.
She said she thought Ms Hand had been chatting to McGregor on Instagram and she became aware an arrangement had been made for him to collect them.
Ms Kealey said McGregor arrived with a car and driver. She and Ms Hand got into the back seat with him and they drove around, stopping at two houses.
She said Mr Lawrence came out of the second house and the group then went on to the hotel. She agreed with Mr Farrell that they arrived some time around midday on December 9.
The court heard there were two rooms in the penthouse, separated by interconnecting doors. One was a bedroom. The other a sitting room with a large sofa.
Asked about the mood in the penthouse, she replied: “Everything was fine.”
Drinks were brought up to the penthouse, Ms Kealey said. She said she thought she had vodka.
Ms Kealey agreed with Mr Farrell that at some point McGregor and Ms Hand went into the bedroom.
She agreed with Mr Farrell that she stayed in the sitting room with Lawrence and that she had sex with him. She agreed condoms were used.
Ms Kealey said everything seemed fine when Ms Hand eventually came out of the bedroom.
She could not remember if she came out more than once.
In answer to questions from Mr Farrell, she said she did not notice any bite marks on McGregor or bruises on Ms Hand.
The court has seen CCTV evidence of her leaving the hotel with McGregor around 6pm.
She said she had asked for a lift as her phone was broken and they both lived in Co Kildare.
Ms Kealey said that as she was leaving she said goodbye to Ms Hand and gave her a hug. She said Ms Hand “wanted everyone to stay”.
Her next contact with Ms Hand was when Ms Hand messaged her from the Rotunda Hospital on December 10. Ms Hand told her she had been raped.
“I was surprised because I didn’t see anything,” she said.
Ms Kealey said Ms Hand told her to delete the messages.
Earlier the court heard that DNA matches for Conor McGregor were obtained from semen swabs taken from Ms Hand’s vagina and a black jumpsuit she had been wearing.
Dr Charlotte Murphy of Forensic Science Ireland said the profiles were 1,000 million times more likely to be a match for Conor McGregor than not.
However, she said McGregor’s associate James Lawrence was “excluded as a possible contributor” to the DNA profiles obtained.
Dr Murphy also gave evidence that in her opinion a ripped strap on the jumpsuit was “not from wear and tear, but pulling”.
Both men claim they each twice had consensual sex with twice with Ms Hand.
But she alleges she was “brutally raped and battered” by McGregor and has no memory of any sexual involvement with Lawrence.
In her evidence, Dr Murphy said: “The presence of semen or absence doesn’t address the issue of consent.
“It is not possible to scientifically address that.”
Dr Murphy also said DNA “may or may not transfer” during sexual contact.
The forensic scientist was one of the final witnesses to be called by Ms Hand’s legal team.
Three other witnesses today gave evidence which may have a bearing on Ms Hand’s claim for damages against both men, including damages to cover the cost of relocating from Drimnagh and for loss of earnings.
Patrick Sheehan, a property valuer, said he had valued a three-bedroom house co-owned by Ms Hand in Drimnagh at €430,000.
He told her barrister Siún Leonowicz that he had been asked to provide guide prices for similar properties in other areas, including Shankill and Cabinteely.
“They were all coming in over €500,000 and under €700,000,” he said.
Elva Breen, a vocational assessor, told the court, said Ms Hand had attempted to return to work in a hair salon two months after the alleged events in the hotel but was unable to stay working there.
She said the workplace became “intolerable” for Ms Hand
“She was struggling with significant anxiety and panic attacks and having a customer facing role,” said Ms Breen, who assessed her as not being fit for such employment in December 2020.
The assessor said that while Ms Hand had tried to return to the workforce, first as a cleaner and later in another salon, she ended up handing in her notice after short periods.
Ms Breen said Ms Hand found working in a salon “extremely anxiety provoking” and “extremely triggering”.
She said she did not believe Ms Hand could return to the type of work she had been doing up to December 2018, but could do an entry level administrative job that was not customer-facing.
Actuary Peter Byrne told Ms Leonowicz he had calculated Ms Hand’s potential loss of earnings up to the age of 66 at €962,665. This was based on her never returning to work.
If she did take up part-time administrative work, he calculated her loss of earnings at €575,868.
Mr Byrne also said he had calculated that Ms Hand had missed out on earnings of €174,585 up to August of this year as a result of being unable to work.
The trial is continuing before a jury of four men and eight women.
Earlier in the case, the jury was shown evidence of extensive bruising on Ms Hand’s body in the aftermath of the alleged events.
They also heard how during the course of the Christmas party, Ms Hand consumed beer, Bacardi and cocaine.
Ms Hand gave evidence she decided she wanted to continue partying.
She had been in communication with McGregor, who she knew, via Instagram during the party and he came in a car driven by a security guard to pick up her Ms Kealey from the salon around 10.15am on December 9.
Ms Hand has given evidence that on the way to the hotel, Lawrence was picked up from his home.
She alleges she McGregor choked her three times and violently raped her in the bedroom of the penthouse in the hours that followed.
But lawyers for McGregor and Lawrence maintain that CCTV footage from the hotel later that day was not consistent with her claims.
In the footage, a barefoot Ms Hand could be seen accompanying McGregor, Lawrence, and Ms Kealey in the lift down from the penthouse to the underground carpark around 6pm, from where McGregor and Ms Kealey departed.
Further footage showed her in the lift patting Lawrence on the backside, hugging him and kissing him on the cheek. At different points she could be seen stumbling and at one stage she was sat on the floor of the elevator.
Ms Hand has said she had no memory of the events shown in the CCTV, and maintains she was drunk, high on drugs and in a state of delayed shock at the time.
Lawrence claims they subsequently had sex twice in the penthouse that evening. Ms Hand described this account as “a made up story” and said her next memory was of waking up in a taxi on her own later that night.