{"id":133135,"date":"2025-09-12T21:40:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-12T21:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/133135\/"},"modified":"2025-09-12T21:40:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T21:40:12","slug":"england-boxing-coach-michael-driscoll-accused-of-sexual-assault","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/133135\/","title":{"rendered":"England boxing coach Michael Driscoll accused of sexual assault"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told police she was attacked by the former boxer after he pushed his way into her room.<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\n Lewes Crown Court in Brighton heard the woman was sexually assaulted by former boxer Mick Driscoll, 56, in 2019.\n<\/p>\n

\n He denies all charges.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He pushed the door open, pinned me against the mirror and tried to kiss me.\n<\/p>\n

\n “It was Boom! and it wasn’t a kiss, it was a slobbering all over my face.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He wouldn’t get off me, he wouldn’t move.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I was trying to fight him off,” the woman told police in a recorded interview.\n<\/p>\n

\n The woman said there was a break when her phone rang and she turned away.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I was scared and angry,” she said.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I stormed off and faced the window.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I just assumed and hoped he’d left.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I put the phone down, turned round and he had stripped off except for his pants and socks and he was sitting on the corner of the bed.”\n<\/p>\n

\n The woman said Mr Driscoll continued as soon as she put the phone down.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He went from waiting to jumped up and grabbed me,” she said.\n<\/p>\n

\n “Swung me and threw me on the bed.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He jumped on me.”\n<\/p>\n

\n She described the former light-welterweight as very strong.\n<\/p>\n

\n “We didn’t even have a conversation,” she said.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I couldn’t believe my eyes when I turned around and he’s taken his clothes off.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He was very strong.\n<\/p>\n

\n “This was a different level.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He was using his hands to try and take my clothes off.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I was trying to hit him and stop him.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He was slobbering all down over me,” the woman said.\n<\/p>\n

\n The woman said she locked herself in the bathroom where she dressed before running for the door.\n<\/p>\n

\n She told police Mr Driscoll said he thought she would want to brag about sleeping with him.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He said he thought I would want to because he’s Mick Driscoll and I could say I’d slept with Mick Driscoll.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He’d told people I’d answered the door in sexy lingerie.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I don’t know why he’s saying it,” the woman said.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I was in my nightie.”\n<\/p>\n

\n Hannah Edwards for the defence asked the witness if she had invited Mr Driscoll for a drink the night before he went to her hotel room.\n<\/p>\n

\n “That’s a lie.\n<\/p>\n

\n “It’s absolutely ridiculous,” the woman said.\n<\/p>\n

\n Ms Edwards said the woman had invented an attempt by Mr Driscoll to kiss her.\n<\/p>\n

\n “He did.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I laughed it off,” the woman said.\n<\/p>\n

\n The woman said she answered her hotel room door to Mr Driscoll the following morning wearing her nightie.\n<\/p>\n

\n Ms Edwards asked why the woman had not put more clothes on.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I didn’t think I was in danger.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I didn’t open the door fully,” the woman said.\n<\/p>\n

\n Ms Edwards told the witness: “I’m going to suggest you were wearing black, silky lingerie.”\n<\/p>\n

\n The woman said she was wearing a nightie.\n<\/p>\n

\n “I know what I was wearing,” she said.\n<\/p>\n

\n Michael Driscoll denies three counts of sexual assault over two occasions in 2019.\n<\/p>\n

\n The award winning coach worked as a talent scout for England Boxing.\n<\/p>\n

\n He oversaw the development of more than 100 national champions.\n<\/p>\n

\n As a former boxer, he fought for the British title and narrowly missed being selected for the Seoul Olympics as light-welterweight.\n<\/p>\n

\n Oliver Dunkin, for the Crown, described the behaviour of the boxing coach as “more akin to the kind of sexist, misogynistic behaviour you used to see in the media of the 1970s.”\n<\/p>\n

\n The trial at Lewes Crown Court in Brighton continues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told police she was attacked by the former boxer…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133136,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-133135","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-boxing","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}