Rahimullah Hotak (25) made 45 separate payments totalling €45,208.53 between January 2020 and April 2021. The court heard he sent the money to his home country of Afghanistan as well as to Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Serbia, Greece and Turkey

The Criminal Courts of Justice, Dublin. (stock image)(Image: Collins Courts )

A man who transferred €45,000 to accounts in six different countries when he was a teenager on social welfare has been given a suspended 18-month sentence.

Rahimullah Hotak (25) made 45 separate payments totalling €45,208.53 between January 2020 and April 2021. The court heard he sent the money to his home country of Afghanistan as well as to Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Serbia, Greece and Turkey.

This amount was “totally out of proportion” to the funds he would have had access to at the time as a 19-year-old, Judge Orla Crowe said while sentencing him today.

She noted there were “troubling features” in the case, including where the money had come from, and that she had adjourned it to assess his risk of re-offending.

Hotak has no previous convictions and the court heard today that the Probation Service has deemed him to be at low risk of re-offending.

Judge Crowe said she had taken this report into consideration, along with the fact that it has been five years since the offending took place and he has not offended in the interim. She handed down a sentence of 18 months which she suspended for a period for three years on a number of conditions.

Hotak, with an address at Rosscourt Rise, Lucan in Dublin, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to one count of money laundering.

Detective Garda Niall McCormack told Karl Moran BL, prosecuting, that although each transaction was below the amount that would attract attention, the number of countries to which the money was being transferred raised suspicions. There was no evidence as to where the money came from.

He said the income of Hotak, who was receiving various social welfare payments at the time, was out of proportion with the money being sent. He was arrested, but made no admissions.

Under cross-examination by Oisín Clarke BL, the detective agreed that Hotak had come here in December 2016. His brother was already here and he was allowed in as part of the family reunification programme.

Hotak’s mother still lives in Afghanistan and the detective did not dispute the assertion that money had been sent to a variety of family and friends. There was no assertion by the defendant that any of the money was legitimate.

The court heard the defendant returned to Afghanistan to get married after this offence, but came back here knowing there was an investigation against him. He now has a child in Afghanistan whom he has never met.

Mr Clarke said that Hotak’s father was killed by a bomb when his client was young and his mother felt it was safer for her sons to move to Ireland. A younger brother has since joined them.

He came here unable to speak English and spent nine months attending an English language school before going into Transition Year in secondary school. He didn’t finish his schooling after Covid-19 and was later diagnosed with depression.

He now works in a garage, having previously worked in a supermarket and delivering pizzas.

Counsel said that Hotak hopes to return to Afghanistan and bring his wife and child back to Ireland.

“He recognises that this country has been very good to him, that he has been receiving support from a variety of state agencies and has thrown that back in their faces,” he said.

“He says he was using cocaine, alcohol,” he continued. “He’s Muslim. All of those are completely forbidden. But he tried to fit in with a variety of individuals and got in with a very bad crowd.”

He mooted that many of the offences were carried out while Hotak was 18 or 19.

Mr Clarke noted that Hotak had returned from Afghanistan in the full knowledge he would be facing these charges, in circumstances where there is no extradition agreement between the two countries.

Judge Crowe noted that the amount of money transferred was much more significant than that involving money mules often before this court.

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