Domino's Pizza delivery worker told 'You can stop crying now' after being racially abused to the point of tears, Craigavon court hears

Ronald Gary Lutton, aged 42, from Killycomain Drive, appeared before Craigavon Magistrates Court on Wednesday charged with two counts of common assault.

The court heard that on October 5, last year at around midnight one of the injured parties was working as a delivery driver for Domino Pizza. He attended an address at Killycomain Drive to deliver food.

"The defendant began shouting at him ‘Don’t you understand English. I cancelled my order’,” said the Prosecutor, adding Lutton was calling the injured party a “foreigner”.

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When the man told him he didn’t know about any cancellation, the defendant “charged at him, face to face”. He was shouting “go away, go f**k yourself”, “go back to your own country”, “go home, we don’t need you, you f**king foreign mother f**ker”.

“This then put the injured party in fear and the defendant said ‘if you want you can stop crying now’,” said the Prosecutor, adding that the defendant followed the man as he made his way back to his car.

"The defendant pushed the injured party with force from behind. The injured party tried to close the door of his car and drive off but the defendant held the door while he was trying to close it.

"The injured party said he would call police and the defendant replied ‘they will do nothing’,” said the Prosecutor. “This incident left the injured party very scared and shaken.”

The Prosecutor revealed that on October 17 last year another injured party was working for a delivery driver for Domino’s Pizza. At 10.30pm he went to deliver to the same address with a delivery for “Ronnie”.

"When the defendant answered at the address, he said: ‘It’s cancelled – get the f**k away from my porch’. The injured party tried to explain that the order didn’t show as cancelled and asked if he could contact his manager.

"The defendant began yelling ‘f**king foreigner, why are you in this country? Get away from my porch’,” said the Prosecutor.

The injured party calmly asked if the defendant could let his manager know that the order was cancelled otherwise it would be deducted from the injured party’s own pay.

"The defendant became even more enraged and grabbed a metal rod, swung it around asking: ‘Are you afraid, are you going to cry?’.

"The injured party was afraid that he was going to be hit in the face,” said the Prosecutor, adding the delivery driver left in fear.

After the defendant was arrested he made no reply to caution. During interview, the statements were read to him and he stated: “I disagree. I am self-employed and 25% of my work is for foreign nationals so I have no objections to them.”

Asked if he pushed the man from behind he denied it saying “I definitely didn’t assault him. There’s a load of lies in that to make up a statement.”

When asked about grasping a metal rod he said: “No, the two stories are the same so I think they have come together to make it up.”

Lutton’s barrister Mr David McKeown said it was “totally unedifying series of events for which Mr Lutton does not offer any excuse”.

He pointed to the pre-sentence report which explains what was going on in his life then. “It’s quite a sensitive matter so I won’t share it in open court," he said, adding the stress of that led him to alcohol.

Mr McKeown said Lutton is fully aware of the impact of his actions and “has considerable empathy” for the victims and wishes to apologise. “He is deeply remorseful.”

The barrister said Lutton has historically had problems with alcohol however this has been a “wake-up call” in that he now abstinent since the incident. He said Lutton is open to any community-based order and asked for leniency.

District Judge Michael Ranaghan said: “There is nothing in your past or in your criminal record that I can see that prompted this racially aggravated behaviour.”

The District Judge said he had read the Probation Report and it seemed Lutton “didn’t understand” his behaviour on those nights. He said Lutton acknowledged the impact his actions had on the victims, their families and wider community and wanted to apologise to both of them.

"That speaks to insight Mr Lutton. The other side of the coin is that two men were put in fear and their race was used against them to put them in that fear. And a weapon was used albeit no one was struck by it,” said the District Judge, adding that the custody threshold was open.

"That will not do any positive good so I am going to replace that (custody) with a Combination Order,” he told the defendant.

Lutton was ordered to be under the supervision of Probation for one year. He also ordered him to carry out 100 hours of Community Service – the maximum number permitted and due to the fact these were “racially motivated assaults”.

"You’ve said you want to apologise to these men. You will apologise to them in writing through Probation. You will not have their address. You can set out why you think you did what you did and make it clear you have deep remorse for that,” said the District Judge, adding that it is part of the Probation Order. "The alternative will be custody,” he continued.