Masked men invaded Nikita Hand's home earlier this year

The woman who accused Conor McGregor and his friend of rape moved this year after her property was invaded by a group of men wearing balaclavas who stabbed her partner and broke her windows, it can now be reported.

Lawyers for Nikita Hand told the High Court before her civil action against Mr McGregor and James Lawrence began that they were not making the claim that Mr McGregor had anything to do with the incident at her house in the Drimnagh area earlier in June.

Mr Justice Owens ruled the evidence was irrelevant to the case and should not go before the jury.

During the trial, the jurors heard that Ms Hand was making a claim for the costs of relocating and buying a house in a different area but they were not told why this claim was being made.

They heard a brief reference by her doctor Frank Clarke who told the court that she moved away from the area because of "something that happened".

The jury heard evidence from valuer Patrick Sheehan that in June 2024, he valued the house she owned in Drimnagh with her former partner at around €430,000.

Mr Sheehan said he was asked to look at prospective properties in "superior areas" in another part of Dublin to see how much they would cost to buy.

He said they looked at a number of properties, all coming in at over €500,000 and under €700,000.

In his closing speech to the jury, Mr McGregor’s senior counsel Remy Farrell referred to Ms Hand’s claim for €665,000 to buy a house in a "nicer area".

He told the jury they may wonder how that could arise in the case, and said they were not alone as it was "not normally a feature of compensation claims" that someone would say they would like a new house.

John Gordon also addressed it in his closing speech, saying the jury knew Ms Hand lived in fear and that she wanted and needed to get away from the area she had lived in.

He said receiving vindication from the jury would not change the fact that she would live with what happened for the rest of her days and would always be "a marked woman" because she stood up to Conor McGregor.

Senior Counsel Ray Boland on behalf of Ms Hand had told the judge before the jury was sworn that her legal team wanted to introduce an event that happened on 14 June 2024.

He said Ms Hand’s home was invaded by a group of men wearing balaclavas.

They burst into Ms Hand’s bedroom, he told the court and were "driven out by her partner", who suffered stab wounds in the process.

Her young daughter who was in another bedroom called 999.

Mr Boland said the invaders broke the front windows of the house and left before gardaí arrived.

Mr Boland said Ms Hand’s lawyers were "obviously not laying that at the feet of the defendants or saying they had anything to do with that".

But he said they were making the claim that it was not an untargeted attack and that it arose from supporters of Mr McGregor.

He said they would have no difficulty telling the jury that they were not claiming that Mr McGregor had anything to do with it.

But he said it was relevant to Ms Hand’s claim that she had to move from Drimnagh and relevant to her state of anxiety.

Mr Farrell told the judge this was something his side knew nothing about and he said it was "extraordinary" that there would be an attempt to smuggle it into the case in what he described as an "extraordinary and unprecedented" claim for relocation costs.

The jury did not hear about the event as Mr Justice Owens ruled it was "completely irrelevant" and should not be referred to during the trial.