The Galway District Court heard this week how a 71-year-old woman was left devastated after her home was ransacked by a cash-strapped heroin addict who callously threw items of sentimental value to her in a river, never to be seen again.
At Monday’s sitting Judge Mary Fahy described the actions of Thomas Kelly as shocking, ransacking the woman’s house for cash to buy drugs, and then compounding this by driving a car while disqualified. She then convicted Kelly and imposed a total jail sentence of 14 months and disqualified him from driving for five years.
The 34-year-old of 19 Corrach Bui, Rahoon, pleaded guilty to burglary at a house in Roscahill on August 21, 2011, to driving without insurance at Moyola Park, Newcastle, on August 25, 2011, and to failing to appear in court on September 8, 2011.
Garda Paul Duffy gave evidence of arresting the defendant on foot of a bench warrant on October 9 at noon and later charging him with offences. He said that on August 22 a burglary had taken place between the hours of 1pm and 3.15pm. A window had been removed from the back of the house before it was totally “ransacked”. The culprit made off with €400 in cash and numerous items of jewellery. The court heard that four days later, Garda Duffy was on patrol in the Moyola Park area when he observed the defendant driving a vehicle despite being disqualified at the time. After making a demand for production of insurance, Garda Duffy’s suspicions grew when he saw the defendant wearing a brown leather watch with a distinctive good face, a watch that matched the description of one that was stolen in the burglary. When questioned about the watch Kelly admitted it had been taken during the burglary.
“That was very good detection on your part,” noted Judge Fahy. Garda Duffy then informed Judge Fahy that the injured party was in court and that on the day of the burglary had only left her house for two hours to go grocery shopping.
Garda Duffy then agreed with defence solicitor Adrian MacLynn that Kelly had been fully co-operative. He told the court that Kelly had returned the watch and admitted the burglary “then and there”. However he later said that the watch was the only item that was retrieved, while the rest of the jewellery, which was of sentimental value to the injured party, had been thrown into a river while the money was spent on drugs.
The court heard that Kelly has a number of previous convictions including a nine-month jail sentence imposed by Galway Circuit Court in July 2010 for possession of certain articles to be used in the course of a burglary and in 2009 there were convictions for possession of drugs, criminal damage, and unauthorised carriage in an MPV.
Mr MacLynn said his client, a father of three, was a heroin addict with very serious difficulties. He said Kelly had committed the burglary because he was “cash-strapped” and because of his addictions was hell-bent on getting money for heroin.
The injured party later told Judge Fahy that her house had been “trashed”, so much so that she was still finding that items had gone missing. She said that she had only gone out for a short time and was shocked to discover what had happened and she had lost items that were of great sentimental value.
Judge Fahy remarked that the case against Kelly was made more serious by the fact that he was driving while disqualified and that the vehicle was then used to commit a burglary. “Another worrying factor is that the glass was taken out of the window, so it was done in a calculated manner... The garda should be commended for his good detection,” said Judge Fahy.
Leave to appeal was granted.
