Addict threatened to stab girl to death
A heroin addict who told a 12-year-old girl he would "stab her to death" if she did not hand over her mobile phone, has been jailed for two years by Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
John Paul McDonagh, aged 21, of Cara Park, Coolock, pleaded guilty to the robbery and to stealing a car on March 26, 2004.
Garda Dermot McKenna told Mr Vincent Heneghan BL, prosecuting, that the girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was listening to the radio on her mobile phone with some friends when McDonagh and his girlfriend approached her.
They asked her if she knew where the "Whites" lived. The girl turned to look and saw that McDonagh was pointing a screwdriver at her. He gestured the screwdriver towards her stomach and said he would stab her if she did not give him the phone.
Garda McKenna told Mr Heneghan that the girl was in fear of her life, and gave the phone to McDonagh who then fled the scene.
McDonagh was arrested by gardaĂ after the girl identified him through photographs she was shown at the garda station. He admitted robbing the girl and stealing a Nissan Sunny car outside a house in Raheny, on the same day.
Garda McKenna agreed with Ms Caroline Biggs BL, defending, that the car was returned to its owner but said there was damage to the ignition and the driverâs door.
He further accepted that both McDonagh and his girlfriend were under the influence of drugs at the time of the robbery and that McDonagh had sold the mobile to allow him to buy drugs.
Ms Biggs told Judge Desmond Hogan that McDonagh had been a heroin addict from the age of 16 and committed the offense in desperate circumstances.
Judge Hogan accepted that McDonaghâs early guilty plea meant the young girl would not have to be put through the trauma of giving evidence in a criminal trial.
He noted that while McDonagh had 12 previous convictions, none of them related to violent offenses, but it was an aggravating factor in the case that a screwdriver was produced on such a young girl and that a serious threat had been made to her life.
He sentenced McDonagh to two years in prison and backdated it to March 29, 2004, when he first went into custody for the offense.
