Bogus househunter jailed for robbery

A Chinese man who robbed three fellow nationals at knifepoint after he went to view a room in their house in Lucan has been jailed for four years.

Guan Taibang, aged 22, of no fixed abode, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to robbery at Woodville Close in Lucan on February 20, 2003.

A charge of producing a knife in a threatening manner was taken into account.

Detective Garda Brendan Walsh told Mr Kerida Naidoo BL, prosecuting, that Guan had gone to the house with two other Chinese men where he was to view a room for rent.

However the three students who were living in the house, Han Wenjung, Shi Zin and Chengdho Zhu were then threatened with knives and robbed.

They were tied up with masking tape and gagged as the men made their escape with €7,300 worth of property, including clothing and CDs.

Mr Giollaiosa O Lideadha BL, defending, said his client had come to Ireland from China to study in January 2002.

A couple of months later he said Guan was robbed of €1,400 although Det. Garda Walsh said there was no record of the incident at Store Street garda station, where he claimed to have reported the crime.

He said Guan had started hanging around arcades and had developed a gambling problem.

He was ashamed of his failure to make it in Ireland and had ended up sleeping in a hallway and living on biscuits after he decided he couldn’t ask his parents for any more money.

Mr O Lideadha said his client described what he had done as "horrible" and wished to apologise to the victims.

Several testimonials were produced in court which described him as a man of previously good character.

Judge Joseph Matthews said Guan had committed a serious crime by tying up his country men and threatening them with weapons after they had been willing to offer him a place as a housemate.

He noted that the three victims had been hurt emotionally rather than physically and had been shaken that one of their own could do this after they had extended the hand of friendship.

However he took Guan’s guilty plea, his previous good character and the fact that he was alone emotionally in a foreign country into account.

He suspended the last two years of the four year sentence with regard to Guan’s young age and the fact that he would have to serve the time in a foreign country.