Addict who robbed grandmother jailed for five years

A heroin addict who stole €9,000 from his then 81-year-old grandmother to buy drugs and his accomplice have been given five-year suspended sentences at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.

Jonathan Clarke (aged 25) of O’Devaney Gardens and his accomplice also locked his grandmother in a cupboard under her stairs which they then blocked with a sofa after they robbed her.

Clarke and Gareth Dowdall (aged 26) of Drumalee Road, Cabra pleaded guilty to the robbery of the woman on December 4, 2003.

Judge Donagh McDonagh imposed a five-year jail term on both culprits but suspended the sentences on conditions that they remain out of trouble .

Detective Garda Andy Tuite of Cabra garda station told Mr Noel Whelan BL, prosecuting, that when Clarke’s grandmother answered a knock to her back door, the two men with their heads covered pushed her back into the house and put her sitting in a chair while they searched a smock she was wearing under her apron.

Det Garda Tuite said they took a number of purses, containing €9,000 in total, from the pockets of this smock and pushed the lady into a cupboard under the stairs. They blocked the cupboard with a sofa and fled the scene but she forced it open and got help from a neighbour.

She was reluctant to identify the men but four days after the offence she admitted that the perpetrators were her grandson Clarke and his friend, Dowdall.

She was treated by a doctor for minor injuries but refused to go to hospital. Although she was in shock at first, she had since recovered and was no longer nervous to leave the house.

Det Garda Tuite agreed with Ms Geraldine Small BL, defending, that Clarke had a chronic drug addiction at the time and this resulted in him living on the streets.

He further accepted that Clarke and Dowdall had spent €8,200 of the cash stolen on cocaine and heroin, in a matter of days.

Mr Luigi Rea BL, defending, said Dowdall gave €800 to his partner to help with their baby but her family returned the money to Clarke’s grandmother as soon as they learned its origin

Det Garda Tuite said this €800 was the only amount recovered from the robbery.

Mr Rea told Judge McDonagh that Dowdall fled Ireland to Germany in April of last year but returned some six months later completely drug free. He then handed himself into gardaí on December 3 last and had been remanded in custody since then.