Two-year prison term for tax offences

The family of a 62-year-old operator of a Cork cleaning company, jailed for two years after admitting tax offences amounting to hundreds of thousands of euro, burst into tears at his sentencing yesterday.

Barry McDonald of McDonald Cleaning Services Ltd of Unit 9, Rockgrove industrial estate, Little Island, Co Cork, and of Factory Hill, Kilcoolishal, Glanmire, was given a three-year jail sentence, with the last year suspended, for the offences committed over a nine-year period.

When Judge Patrick J Moran heard the crying from the public gallery at Cork Circuit Criminal Court, he said: “I am sorry. This is my duty.”