2 years’ jail for woman ‘gobbled up by gang’

A woman described as a “sprat” gobbled up by drugs gang “rats” was yesterday jailed for two years.

Margaret Purcell agreed to move cannabis worth €11,900 from one area of the city to another in order to pay off her son’s drug debt, Limerick Circuit Criminal Court heard.

Ms Purcell, aged 47, of Moylish Rd, Ballynanty, Co Limerick, who the court heard had never previously come under the Garda radar, pleaded guilty to possessing the drugs for sale or supply.

Det Gda Peter Colleran gave evidence of seeing Ms Purcell at Lee Estate on the night of Nov 10, 2011, carrying a plastic bag.

He became suspicious. After intercepting her when she got into a taxi, the drugs were found in the bag.

The court heard she feared for her own safety and that of her son due to a debt he owed for drugs and agreed to move the drugs to pay off this debt.

Brendan Nix, defending, said Ms Purcell failed what he described as the oxygen test in trying to rescue her only child from a dangerous gang to whom he owned money.

“She failed the oxygen test whereby on a Ryanair flight a stewardess will tell passengers that in the unlikely event of decompression during the flight, oxygen masks would descent from overhead, and in such event passengers were to put them on immediately before they tried to fit them to any child who may be with them as if the adult passed out they would be of no assistance to the child. She failed that test as she put the mask on her son first.

“She was in fear for herself and her son. She was a sprat gobbled up by these rats, and she has been in prison of a kind without bars.”

Judge Carroll Moran said drugs were a malign influence on Irish society and were now everywhere. The amount of cannabis was very substantial, he added.

Accepting she was easy prey, Judge Moran said the court would not be doing others who might be easy prey any favours if he did not deal with the offence by way of a custodial sentence.