A YOUNG “habitual criminal” who stole cash from an elderly man has been given a 10-year sentence, with four suspended, for his latest offences.
Judge Patrick McCartan at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court noted that Joseph O’Brien (23) had reached his sixth conviction for possessing drugs for sale or supply, among other crimes.
O’Brien, Reuben Walk, Rialto, pleaded guilty to possessing €6,500 worth of heroin at Rialto Court on July 7th, 2007.
He also pleaded guilty to the robbery of €500 from a 76-year-old man outside a Rialto off-licence on July 7th, 2008, stealing €150 cash and a number of cigarette boxes in a Kilmainham robbery on October 10th, 2008, and attempting to rob a Thomas Street store with an imitation gun on February 16th last. He had 28 previous convictions.
Garda Diarmuid O’Donovan said his colleague identified O’Brien and an accomplice on the off-licence’s CCTV, knocking the old man to the ground and robbing him of his money.
Garda O’Donovan told Róisín Lacey, prosecuting, that O’Brien admitted his role in the attack when he was arrested.
Garda Séamus O’Donavan told Ms Lacey that he and a colleague spotted O’Brien getting out of a stolen Honda Civic with another man carrying “a large black object” shortly after a shop robbery in Kilmainham on October 10th, 2008.
O’Brien admitted he had stolen the car so he could drive around looking for somewhere to rob. He said he ran into the Kilmainham shop with a knife, beat the shop owner with the knife handle and stole €150.
Garda Peter Mullins said O’Brien, whom he described as a “habitual criminal”, grabbed one worker and held the gun to his neck, but was forced to flee when a second worker overpowered him.
Deirdre Cummins, defending, said her client had been a drug addict since his early teens, but had been “clean” in custody.