NIGHTMARE

Dad is extradited from US and thrown in jail for 7 months before being cleared over pub brawl attack... 41 years ago

- LIZZIE McALLISTER

AN Irish citizen who was booted out of the US and extradited to Britain over a 41-year-old pub brawl said the ordeal was a “nightmare”.

Rory McGrath was shocked when about a dozen officers from the US Marshals Service turned up at his front door in New York with guns drawn.

What followed was a months-long ordeal that saw Mr McGrath sent back to the UK, where he sat in jail for seven months awaiting trial away from his wife and two children back in the States.

He told the BBC: “It’s been very stressful for everybody. It’s like Ground Zero – I don’t care to think about it, but it’s always going to be there.”

Leeds-born Mr McGrath’s story started in March 1980, when he was 21.