A judge yesterday held a family responsible for their 14-year-old daughter who left two elderly women traumatised after she violently burgled their homes.
The girl was released from custody yesterday but forbidden from going out in public unless in the company of her parents. Her father lodged compensation for the victims in court.
Judge Aingeal Ní Chondúin ordered the family, originally from Romania and on social welfare, to collect €600, which was to be divided evenly between the two victims, aged 80 and 63.
Yesterday in the Children's Court she gave the family until October to pay the compensation, but the money was produced when a youth entered the court and handed over a wad of money to the girl's father.
The girl was then given conditional release, and banned from going out in public unless she was in the company of her parents. She was also forbidden from going to the Dún Laoghaire area, where the burglaries occurred.
Judge Ní Chondúin ordered a probation bond, and bound the teenage girl, who had been held in custody for the last 1½ weeks, to the peace for one year. She stressed that if she reoffended within that time she would be detained for two years.
The girl, who lives in west Dublin, was aged 13 when she committed the two burglaries in Dún Laoghaire on November 27th last year. "The parents are responsible for this child and her actions, and I am going to make them feel that responsibility," said Judge Ní Chondúin.
The court heard one of the victims opened her front door to find the girl on her knees begging. She gave the girl €1.50, at which she then asked for a plaster. She then started pushing the door as the elderly woman tried to force it shut. Another person with the defendant, a girl believed to be aged 11, helped in trying to keep the door open. Meanwhile the teenage girl pressed her shoulder against the door in an effort to overpower the woman. Eventually the victim managed to close the door and called gardaí.