Man wore ‘Scream’ mask in sweetshop robbery

A ‘Scream’ mask was worn by a man who carried out a robbery at a sweetshop in Cork city and yesterday he confessed to the crime.

Niall Cronin, aged 24, of 1 Fairfield Green, Farranree, Cork, was arraigned at Cork Circuit Criminal Court yesterday and he confirmed his plea of guilty to the charge of carrying out a robbery of €60 at Sheila’s shop on St Mary’s Rd, Cork, on Tuesday, October 10, 2017.

Stephen O’Donoghue, defending, applied for the adjournment of sentencing.

“He is 24 years old,” Mr O’Donoghue told the court. “He had a serious heroin addiction. He was under the influence of heroin on the day. The offence was committed to get money to feed that habit.”

Ray Boland, prosecuting, said there was no objection to sentencing being adjourned provided the accused was in custody.

Judge Seán Ó Donnabháin put sentencing back until May 10, with the accused to remain in custody until then.

Detective Garda Malcolm Walsh previously gave details of the robbery when matters were alleged at the district court for a bail application by Cronin.

He said the robbery was committed at 10.40am that Tuesday and that there was nobody present at the time except for the 65-year-old woman working there.

It was alleged that a man wearing a ‘Scream’ mask produced a large screwdriver and said to the shopkeeper: “Hand over the money.”

The woman managed to come out from behind the counter and get out of the shop.

It was alleged that the raider went behind the counter and grabbed approximately €60 from the till and then ran away.

Furthermore, he said that by the accused man’s own admission he was on nine bags of heroin per day at the time.

The ‘Scream’ mask is based on the Edvard Munch painting and popularised in the series of horror movies of the same name.