A round-up of today's other stories in brief...
€10,000 for boy (7) over finger injury
A seven-year-old boy has been awarded €10,000 for an injury to his finger at a public park in Co Dublin.
Lee O'Connor, Rutland Place, Dublin, will have the money lodged and invested for payment plus interest at the age of 18 .
Circuit Court president Mr Justice Matthew Deery was told how the child was playing in Arthur Griffith Park, Lucan, in April last year when a cement slab fell from a wall, crushing the tip of his right-hand third finger.
His counsel David Conlan Smyth said the nail and finger were bruised but had healed well within three months. South Dublin County Council had offered Lee €10,000 compensation and he was recommending its acceptance by the court.
Sacked chef made hoax call
A former Bewleys Hotel chef, who made hoax calls stating there were bombs in the hotel car park and kitchen, has had his sentence adjourned by Judge Frank O'Donnell at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
David Lamb (33) had been sacked from his job at Bewleys a few days before the incident and told gardaí that he made the hoax calls because he had a grudge against the hotel. "I think they should have been a little more fair to me," he said.
Garda Sinéad Greene said Lamb lost his job because he took days off to spend time with his terminally ill father after the hotel had refused to give him the time off.
His father died in the month following the incident.
Garda Greene said gardaí were called to the hotel on November 7th, 2006, over a bomb scare in the car park.
Lamb, Tonglegee Road, Raheny, pleaded guilty to knowingly making a false report.
Judge O'Donnell said a probation report stated that Lamb had not shown genuine remorse or victim empathy in relation to his crimes. He added that he had not taken the chance he had been given with the previous suspended sentences.
He adjourned sentencing to December, ordered an updated probation report and told Lamb that he was to have €1,000 in court after commenting that he "deserves a custodial sentence".
Sentencing of former garda
Sentence on a former Garda sergeant for child trafficking has been adjourned due to his hospitalisation.
Kieran O'Halloran (48) pleaded guilty last March at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court that in October 2005, he incited a named woman "to organise or knowingly facilitate the use of a child for the purpose of sexual exploitation".
He had been remanded for sentence but Judge Katherine Delahunt adjourned his case to 2009 when told he was in hospital.
€100,000 heroin seized at house
Gardaí in Tralee seized €100,000 worth of illicit drugs at a house in Tralee earlier this week, a local meeting was told.
Supt Pat Sullivan gave details of the find when he warned a meeting of the joint policing committee for the town that heroin use was on the increase.
The number of seizures of the drug destined for sale or supply in the nine months January to September this year increased five-fold and offences of possession had doubled compared to the same period in 2007.
"The emergence of heroin in Tralee is of huge concern to us," Supt Sullivan told the meeting.