Parents held responsible after girl burgled women’s homes

A JUDGE yesterday held a family responsible for their 14-year-old daughter, who has left two elderly women traumatised after she violently burgled their homes.

The girl was released from custody yesterday but forbidden from going out in public unless in the company of her parents, after her father lodged compensation for the victims in court.

Judge Angela Ni Chonduin ordered the family, originally from Romania, who are on social welfare, to collect 600, through a “whip around”, which was to be divided evenly between the two victims, aged 80 and 63.

Yesterday she said she would give the family until October to pay the compensation, but it was produced when a youth entered the court and handed over money to the girl’s father.

The girl was then given conditional release, banned from going out in public and forbidden from going to the Dun Laoghaire area, where the burglaries occurred.

Judge Ni Chonduin ordered a probation bond and bound the teenage girl to the peace for one year.

She stressed that if she reoffended within that time she would be detained for two years.

She ordered the girl, who has been living with her family in Ireland since 1999 and has never gone to school, to co-operate with the Probation and Welfare Service saying that she wanted efforts to be made to get her into the education system.

The girl, who lives in west Dublin, was aged 13 when she committed the two burglaries, in Dun Laoghaire, on November 27 last year, the Children’s Court had heard.

“The parents are responsible for this child and her actions and I am going to make them feel that responsibility,” Judge Ni Chonduin said yesterday as she ordered them to compensate the victims.

The girl had left two elderly women in shock and terrified in their own homes, after she violently forced her way past their front doors, but to date does not understand the seriousness of her actions, the court had heard.