A man who was in a cannabis-induced psychosis when he stabbed his childhood friend in the back in a \u201cbizarre\u201d and random attack has been given a partly suspended sentence. <\/p>\n
Neal Brennan (29) of Sutton Lawn, Sutton, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court<\/a> to assault causing harm to Cian Brennan (no relation) on January 2nd, 2025 on Station Road, Portmarnock<\/a>. He has no previous convictions and has been on remand in custody since his arrest following the attack. <\/p>\n Garda Dylan Toner told prosecuting barrister Kieran Kelly that the victim and Brennan had been childhood schoolfriends. He said they went out for food together that evening and ate the food in Brennan\u2019s car parked up outside a convenience store. <\/p>\n They then went into the shop to get a drink and on returning to the car Brennan stabbed his friend in the back as he was getting into the passenger side of the vehicle.<\/p>\n The victim heard something drop and assumed it was Brennan\u2019s car keys. He then felt the gash in his back and asked his friend \u201cWhat have you done?\u201d<\/p>\n Brennan offered him a lift but the victim shouted again \u201cWhat have you done?\u201d before he went into the shop to get assistance from the staff. He was later treated in hospital. <\/p>\n Toner played CCTV footage to the court which showed the two men entering the shop, returning to Brennan\u2019s car and then the victim running back into the shop following the stabbing.<\/p>\n He said that Brennan was arrested later that same night after garda\u00ed were alerted and given a description of him and details of the car he was driving. He made no significant admissions during his interview with garda\u00ed.<\/p>\n A victim impact statement was read into the record by Kelly. The victim stated that he was hospitalised for four days following the assault as the wound required surgery as it was \u201cextremely close to my spine and vital organs\u201d. <\/p>\n He said he has since experienced emotional distress and feels he was betrayed by someone who was his friend.<\/p>\n \u201cI still remember the person he used to be. I don\u2019t believe he was the same person I knew when we grew up as kids.\u201d <\/p>\n Sentencing Brennan, Judge Ronan Munro said that the victim had provided \u201can extraordinarily magnanimous\u201d victim impact statement in what was a \u201cnightmare scenario to be attacked by someone you considered a friend\u201d. <\/p>\n Munro noted that various reports before the court indicated that Brennan had been experiencing low mood and anxiety since August 2019 and had been referred previously for psychiatric assessment. <\/p>\n \u201cIt seems to me that it is the case that given his background, the bizarre nature of the offending and the absence of any previous convictions, all indicate to me that his moral responsibility, while it is not diminished, it is reduced,\u201d the judge said. <\/p>\n He said the offence was aggravated by the use of a weapon and that he stabbed someone in the back and that the victim then had to undergo surgery. <\/p>\n Munro said a headline sentence of five years was warranted. He reduced this to 3\u00bd years considering his plea of guilty and lack of previous convictions. <\/p>\n He said Brennan\u2019s \u201calmost daily use\u201d of cannabis in the two weeks leading up to the assault seemed to be \u201ca significant contributory factor to this violent assault\u201d before he noted that it is most important \u201cthat this does not happen again\u201d. <\/p>\n Earlier in the hearing, Brennan read a letter he had written for the court. He said he wished to express his deepest remorse and said he deeply regrets the hurt he caused. He said he intends to take the \u201cright positive steps\u201d to ensure this will not happen again and he wants now \u201cto move forward in a positive direction\u201d. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man who was in a cannabis-induced psychosis when he stabbed his childhood friend in the back in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":37565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[51250,61,60,43,20253],"class_list":["post-548329","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-criminal-courts","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-portmarnock"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548329","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=548329"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548329\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=548329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=548329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=548329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}