“The water will stop flowing down the Shannon before you stop drinking,” said the judge to an alcoholic, in court for the 147th time.
Before the court last Wednesday (April 22 ) was Gerry Fallon (49 ), Ardmullen, Kiltoom, Co Roscommon, who had been arrested for his own safety after being found drunk and disorderly again outside the Bank of Ireland on Church Street earlier in the week.
Inspector Nicholas Farrell, for the State, told the court that Fallon had 146 public order convictions from over the last 25 years.
Judge John Neilan, who is very familiar with the defendant, spoke of his surprise at seeing Fallon before him as he had only sent him to jail a fortnight before.
“He's making a meal of it now,” said the judge to Fallon's solicitor, Mr Paul Connellan.
“He was brought to the Midlands Prison, given his Easter egg and released.”
At this point in the proceedings, the judge wanted to rescind Fallon's legal aid because he had money for drink on him on April 14, but Mr Connellan prevailed.
“It's time to cop yourself on,” said the judge to Fallon.
“You should not have been released from prison, as far as I'm concerned. You're nothing but a pure nuisance around this town.”
Fallon attempted to address the court without going through his solicitor but the judge cut him short.
“I've been listening to you for 25 years and you're not going to dictate pace and policy in this court,” he said.
The inspector suggested the judge utilise an exclusion order, which would ban Fallon from all licensed premises in the State.
“I'll make it, for what it's worth,” said the judge.
“You'll never see me back before you again,” offered Fallon.
“You've said that before in this court room, and exactly that on April 4,” said an exasperated judge.
“You're going to spend the rest of your life in prison if you continue with this behaviour.”
Fallon continued to address the court on his own, telling the judge that he recently “had six good months” with his alcoholism.
“If you took the cotton wool out of your ears and put it into your mouth, you might hear what I'm saying,” said Judge Neilan.
“The question is, who is selling alcohol to Mr Fallon?” he asked the court.
“They're as much at fault. It's high time the licencees took responsibility for this. If that's what licencees continue to do, then I'll be looking very closely at their applications [for licence renewals] next September. I don't know how much money it took to chauffeur him to prison last week but there are a lot of pensioners in this country who could've used that money”.
Accepting the fact that custodial or monetary penalties would be pointless at this stage, the judge ordered the exclusion order on Fallon, but voiced his scepticism as to its effectiveness.
“The water will stop flowing down the Shannon before you stop drinking,” he concluded.
