A burglar, who had put a woman in fear by creeping up the stairs towards her bedroom thereby violating her personal space, claimed that he had been asked by an associate to move furnitive, this despite the incident taking place in the early hours of the morning.
The lame excuse was given by Romanian national Marian Linguer (35 ), of no fixed abode but with a former rental addresss in Loughgeorge, Claregalway, who pleaded guilty at Galway District Court on Monday to the offence of entering a building at Raleigh Row, Galway, as a tresspasser with the intention of committing theft of one Fujifilm camera, €150 cash, and one Apple iMac computer, on April 22, 2011.
Inspector Mick Coppinger told the court that at 2.35am gardai responded to a call from the occupant of the house who suspected that there was an intruder.
Shuffling was heard downstairs and the intruder had started to come up the stairs even though it was clear that the occupant was in her bedroom at the time. Gardai came quickly to the scene and Linguer was caught red-handed. He told gardai that he had been asked by another man to help move items and that he thought they belonged to this man.
“It’s a rather strange hour to be moving furniture,” said the inspector who added that the plea of guilty had only been tendered five minutes before the case was heard.
Linguer’s solicitor said that when his client arrived at the house the door was open and the lights were on.
“I don’t accept it [the door] was open, only when the gardai arrived, not before that,” said Inspector Coppinger.
“Are you going to say that the defendant was invited in?” asked Judge Mary Fahy to which the solicitor replied that his client “had been invited by a third party to help move furniture from where he previously lived” and that he did not intend to commit a burglary.
The court heard that the defendant, a father of two, has previous convictions for road traffic and casual trading offences.
“A plea tendered at that late stage really is not a plea at all,” noted Judge Fahy.
The injured party then told Judge Fahy that she had been in her bedroom with the door locked when she heard a noise.
“I got dressed, I felt very violated... I was very nervous afterwards in the house.
“I had to defer my college exams, I have got a dog since and I was paralysed with fear.
“What was going through my mind was, why is he creeping up the stairs?” said the woman, who added that she has since moved address.
“It is a total violation. This man was caught red-handed, the plea was last minute, the lady was in the house and he made inroads into her personal space.
“ I’m going to impose the maximum of 12 months in jail,” said Judge Fahy who then gave leave to appeal with conditions that if bail, pending appeal, is granted that Linguer surrender his passport and identity card, that he not apply for other travel documents, that he stay away from the injured party and her property and supply gardai with an address
