Prisoner who stole €200k Debs money takes up journalism

AN events organiser who hit the headlines when he was jailed for five years for stealing more than €200,000 in deposits for Debs and graduation balls will spend his prison time doing an Open University degree in journalism.

Pat Browne, aged 32, from Inchirahilly, Crookstown, Co Cork, was back before Cork District Court where his educational plans emerged.

Defence solicitor, Frank Buttimer, said Browne was using his time in prison constructively: “He is applying for an Open University course in of all things, journalism. I am sure that will be noted.”

Browne was jailed for five years in May for stealing over €200,000 in deposits for Debs and graduation balls.

Between May 2006 and June 2007 Browne got money from sixth-year class representatives of 26 schools for deposits and reservations for hotels and bands to a total of over €200,000 which he blew on gambling.

His gambling addiction got him into more trouble after the theft of that money as he blew a lot of it in a casino. He then made threats against the owner of the casino in a vain attempt to get the money back.

Browne had a 10-month jail sentence imposed on him on a charge of demanding money with menaces on August 1, 2009, from Finbarr Corkery, proprietor of the premises.

Browne’s educational plans emerged on his latest court appearance for the theft of €3,500 worth of cigarettes.

He pleaded guilty and received a six-month concurrent sentence which will not add to his overall five-year term of imprisonment.

Garda Dan Lordan yesterday explained the background to the cigarettes theft. Browne, it emerged, was starting a business in August last year in the Mac Q shop on Wellington Road. After taking over the premises where there was a cigarette machine, he effectively took the contents of the machine. Mr Buttimer said Browne was legitimately starting a business at the time and would have known he was not entitled to take the cigarettes from the machine – which was the property of a Limerick cigarette-vending company.

The solicitor said the defendant was also putting his prison time to good use by attending counselling for gambling.