Two men were each sentenced to eight years yesterday for their part in an armed raid on a Co Tipperary shopkeeper.
Mr Frank Britton, his wife and their three children were bound, gagged and locked in a storeroom for 17 hours without ventilation before the alarm was raised.
Jeff Fay (27), of Crannagh Hall, Churchtown, Dublin, and John Hackett (28), of Whitechurch Cottages, Dublin, pleaded guilty at Clonmel Circuit Court on Tuesday to stealing cigarettes worth £40,000 and £9,000 cash from Mr Frank Britton at Ballyhomuck, Cloneen, Clonmel, on May 10th, 1997.
They also admitted falsely imprisoning the family on the same date and stealing Mr Britton's car. A third defendant charged with the robbery had his case adjourned until the court's next session in October.
Judge Olive Buttimer said it was to the gardai's credit that both men had been arrested so soon after the robbery. She acknowledged that by pleading guilty the men had spared the Britton family from having to recall their ordeal.
Their guilty pleas also meant they were facing up to their roles in the robbery. She accepted they were not the main perpetrators of this crime and their previous records were not the worst.
She also accepted their expression of remorse to the family and that Fay had telephoned them two days after the robbery. But this was too little too late.
She hoped the Brittons would recover fully from the attack. That a gang would target a house, watch it and then wait for hours before breaking in and confronting the family, was appalling, said Judge Buttimer. One could not but be moved by the evidence, especially the evidence of Mr Britton on behalf of his family, she added.
Det Garda John Courtney said the Britton family had found the experience very distressing. Mr and Mrs Britton had suffered serious injuries when the handcuffs cut into their bones.
In Det Garda Courtney's 25 years with the force, he had never seen a family so upset by a crime. The family was doing its best to recover from the robbery, he said. For many weeks and months they found the nights a trial. They had to employ a security company to guard their home. When the gardai arrived at the Britton house a tool from a nearby garage had to be used to remove the cuffs. Det Garda Courtney said he had never seen a man in such pain.
Mr Britton told the court the family was beginning to come to terms with the ordeal. He was still attending specialists in Dublin. One of his children was attending a psychologist while the others were still very fearful and could not be left alone at night.
Mr Britton said they would all have died if they had to spend another night in the storeroom because they were so short of oxygen.
All they could do was hang on and try to conserve as much energy as possible. His eight-year-old daughter had no handcuffs because they were too big for her hands and she eventually managed to remove the tape from her mouth and the mouths of the rest of the family.
Several people arrived at and left the house because they saw no cars outside and they thought the family was away.
But their babysitter, Christine Egan, decided to walk around the outside of the house when she heard the family's muffled cries and she raised the alarm.