Four months for teen with 30 convictions

A 15-year-old repeat offender, who has a litany of convictions for burglaries, has been given a four month sentence for a trespassing offence.

The boy, who already had 30 criminal convictions, mostly for burglaries, had pleaded guilty at the Dublin Children’s Court to trespassing in the GPO Arcade in Dublin, with intent to commit an offence, on December 14 last year.

Garda Kate Boland of Store Street Station had said the boy had been caught by security guards. “He was found wandering around the staff area; he said that he was looking for a toilet.”

Judge Catherine Murphy imposed a four month sentence to be served in the Trinity House detention centre. The boy, who was supported in court by his father, is also facing a Circuit Court case for allegedly mugging a woman at knifepoint.

In February the boy was given a two year sentence after he admitted to travelling as a passenger in a stolen car, on the Drumcondra Road, Dublin, on January 27.

When he was sentenced in February the judge told the boy that by detaining him the Trinity House Detention centre: “There is so much they can do for you there in terms of drugs and alcohol addiction and literacy skills.”

By then he already had 29 previous convictions: nine burglaries, three assaults, four larcenies, five for escaping from custody, as well as others for public order violations and violent behaviour in a garda station.

The court heard that the boy, who has not been in school for several years, had developed a drug addiction problem.

He is originally from the west of Ireland but his family had been living in Dublin in recent years.

The boy’s parents had moved out of Dublin in a hope to keep him out of trouble and because he was using drugs.

“But the attraction to come back to Dublin was huge and he developed a serious drug addiction,” his solicitor had said.

The boy has also sought assistance for his drug addiction, the court had heard.