Teen raider tried to force housemates to have sex

A Dublin man will be sentenced next week for his role in trying to make a female college student have sex with her male housemates after breaking into their home with a hammer and hacksaw.

Jason Paget (aged 24) had just turned 16 years old when he and co-accused, Stephen Phelan (aged 26), broke into the Dublin home, threatened the three occupants for their ATM cards and personal identification numbers and ordered the woman to have sex with her housemates after she had been made strip naked.

Paget, of Aylward Green, Finglas, was extradited back to Ireland last year after he left for the UK in 2003.

He pleaded guilty at the Central Criminal Court to aggravated burglary at a St Albans Road premises and aggravated burglary and sexual assault of a woman with intent to cause degradation at another Dublin address, all on February 11, 2003. He has no previous convictions.

Phelan, of Poddle Close, Crumlin, previously had his nine-year sentence for these and other serious crimes, including a vicious knife attack, increased to 13 years on a Director of Public Prosecutions appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeal.

Detective Sergeant Joe McLoughlin revealed that Phelan, who had 26 previous convictions at the time of the offence, was the main aggressor in the burglaries and sex assault and had cut the female victim on her back from shoulder to waistline during the ordeal.

Mr John Aylmer SC, defending Paget, asked Mr Justice Paul Carney to take into account his client’s expression of remorse, his guilty plea and the fact he has been of good behaviour since the incidents, despite being “unlawfully at large”.

Mr Justice Carney remanded Paget in custody until sentence next week.

Det Sgt McLoughlin told Ms Isobel Kennedy SC, prosecuting (with Ms Lisa Dempsey BL), that Phelan and Paget, who was armed with a bicycle wheel brace, broke into the St Albans Road premises about 4.30am on February 11, 2003, threatened to “knife” the three male occupants, ordered them into the kitchen and ransacked the home.

The pair took a €300 mini-disc player, a laptop worth €750, a games console and €300 of games in the raid, which lasted between 30 minutes to an hour.

The detective garda said some hours later, a male occupant in the second premises awoke to find an intruder with a Stanley knife in his room and another man in the doorway of his female housemate’s bedroom.

All three housemates were brought into one bedroom while Phelan searched the house and Paget stood with a hammer and hacksaw.

During the ordeal, which lasted nearly two hours, Phelan threatened to cut the woman if she did not lie on a bed with her arms outstretched.

Both youths ordered her to remove her clothes and she eventually stripped to her underpants, which Phelan cut at the hips so they fell off.

He then brought one of her housemates into the room naked and said: “I want the two of you to have sex.”

The woman was brought into the other housemate’s room a short time later, where Phelan ordered this second man to penetrate her.

The man and woman, out of fear, began kissing to make it look like they were having sex.

Det Sgt McLoughlin told Ms Kennedy that Phelan cut the woman on her back and buttock during this incident but was called away by Paget, who was not in the room at that point.

The raiders eventually called a taxi to Blessington and left the premises.

The victims in both raids later told gardaí that they noticed the intruders had been aggressive and “highly strung” during the ordeals.

Det Sgt McLoughlin said Paget was arrested later that month and identified by his victims in an identity parade.

He initially denied all offences in interview but later admitted he had broken into a premises with another “fella”.

He wouldn’t name his accomplice, denied he had inflicted any knife wounds on the victims and denied he had ordered a man and woman to strip naked and have sex.

Det Sgt McLoughlin said Paget took a bench warrant at the Children Court in 2003 and was extradited to Ireland in January last year.

He said Paget, a father-of-two, offered to “face up” to the burglary charges but had made no admissions to the aggravated sexual assault.

He eventually pleaded guilty to all three charges on his trial date earlier this year.

Det Sgt McLoughlin told Ms Kennedy that he had spoken to the victims in each case and they all said the events were “very vivid” in their minds.

He agreed with Mr Aylmer (with Ms Sandra Frayne BL) that Paget had been described by a witness, who had sighted him near a pub earlier that evening, as looking like he was on drugs.

Det Sgt McLoughlin agreed that Phelan had been main aggressor in the incidents.

Mr Aylmer read a letter to the court from his client in which Paget apologised to his victims, said he took full responsibility for his actions and that he had been on a lot of drugs.

He said he was ashamed of his wrongdoing and that he has tried to turn his life around and be a good person, though he realises he has to “face up to what I did all those years ago.”

He described having a “broken childhood” and said, though he didn’t blame his parents; it “might have helped me if they were there for me.”