Craig Carroll (41) of 37 Old Tower Crescent, Clondalkin, Dublin and Dylan McCormick (26) of no fixed abode, received criminal sentences for their role in a drug debt intimidation scheme.<\/p>\n
Carroll was sentenced to five years and three months in prison, with the final nine months suspended, provided he entered into a bond to keep the peace for 12 months post-release.<\/p>\n
McCormick was sentenced to three years and nine months in prison for his role in the intimidation. McCormick was also sentenced in relation to an attempted robbery at the Ballytruckle Post Office in Waterford City.<\/p>\n
McCormick was left with a consecutive sentence of seven years and three months, with the final year of the sentence suspended.<\/p>\n
On March 19, Carroll and McCormick called to a residence on the Dunmore Road, and knocked on a woman\u2019s front door.<\/p>\n
The court saw eight minutes of CCTV footage of the incident. The men told the woman that her son, who was residing in Dublin, owed \u20ac10,000 in drug-related debt and threatened to harm him if he did not pay.<\/p>\n
Carroll told the woman \u201cthe message\u201d was coming from Dublin. He offered the woman a payment plan.<\/p>\n
The men said there were \u201cconsequences when you don\u2019t pay gangsters\u201d and threatened that her son would be in hospital with no legs if he did not pay in due time.<\/p>\n
The incident took place in the presence of a four-year-old child who was inside the woman’s house, but occasionally ran outside the front door.<\/p>\n
Both men were arrested in the coming weeks. McCormick admitted to his role in the crime, while Carroll maintained his right to silence. He later pleaded guilty to the charge.<\/p>\n
McCormick\u2019s phone was seized, where a voice note from Carroll showed plans to circle the Waterford area.<\/p>\n
A victim impact statement, read by Garda Damien Quirke, said: \u201cNo one should feel threatened at their home.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe harm that could come to my neighbours, family, constantly plays in her mind.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese strains will have a knock-on for years to come.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Carroll had 68 previous convictions, relating to drugs, lack of insurance, the possession of a knife and threatening physical abuse. He also had convictions from Spain for bodily harm.<\/p>\n
McCormick had no previous convictions at the time of the intimidation incident. The court heard that McCormick\u2019s parents had once been the centre of drug-related intimidation, and that McCormick knew how the woman would have felt when he threatened her son.<\/p>\n
Acting as defence counsel for McCormick, Gareth Hayden BL said McCormick offered an apology to the impacted family and garda\u00ed.<\/p>\n
He said McCormick\u2019s drug addiction had led to a rapid downward spiral, and that his client had engaged well with the assessment process and wished to use his custodial sentence to rehabilitate.<\/p>\n
Defence counsel for Carroll, Brian P O\u2019Shea BL, argued Carroll had pled guilty at the first possible opportunity when faced with legal advice.<\/p>\n
In his sentencing, Judge Eugene O\u2019Kelly said intimidation of family members was \u201cbecoming more and more prevalent”.<\/p>\n
\u201cDebts seem to continue to increase\u2026whether there was any money owed by [the woman\u2019s] son was not relevant.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Carroll and McCormick] are enforcers who turned up\u2026they are an essential ingredient, foot soldiers in the criminal underworld.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The argument that the men were merely delivering a message, rather than actively threatening the woman, did not hold in Judge O\u2019Kelly\u2019s view.<\/p>\n
The judge complimented the victim for standing firm in the face of the two men and reporting the incident to Garda\u00ed.<\/p>\n
\u201cSuch courage is unfortunately all too rare,\u201d said Judge O\u2019Kelly.<\/p>\n
McCormick\u2019s own experience on the other end of drug-related intimidation, and Carroll\u2019s 68 previous convictions, were deemed aggravating factors in their sentencing.<\/p>\n
Three months later, on June 23, McCormick attempted to rob the Ballytruckle Post Office in Poleberry while on bail for the drug-related intimidation charge.<\/p>\n
McCormick demanded \u20ac20 and \u20ac50 notes from a post office worker behind a glass barrier. The silent alarm was raised on McCormick, and CCTV showed him running from the post office without any money.<\/p>\n
He was identified by Garda\u00ed and had items seized, including knives.<\/p>\n
In a subsequent interview, McCormick admitted it was him in the footage. He had left used gloves in an alley, while he said the knife found on his body was being used for fishing.<\/p>\n
In his sentencing, Judge O\u2019Kelly said while the attempted robbery was a \u201cham-fisted effort\u201d, it \u201cdoesn\u2019t take from the staff and potential customers exposed to fear.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n Funded by the Court Reporting Scheme\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Craig Carroll (41) of 37 Old Tower Crescent, Clondalkin, Dublin and Dylan McCormick (26) of no fixed abode,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":377725,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-377724","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=377724"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377724\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/377725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=377724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=377724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=377724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}