Teen jailed for eight years for Islamist-motivated knife attack on Galway army chaplain

Judge suspends two years of sentence as 17-year-old is held responsible for attempted murder of Defence Forces chaplain

A 17-year-old boy has been given an eight-year jail term for a sustained, Islamist-motivated knife attack on an army chaplain.

Mr Justice Paul McDermott said two years from a 10-year term were being suspended on condition he keep the peace and engage with probation services for three years post release.

The juvenile, who cannot be named because he is a minor, will serve the initial part of his term in Oberstown Children’s Detention Centre before moving to an adult prison upon turning 18 later in the year.

The Central Criminal Court handed down the sentence for the attempted murder of Fr Paul Murphy, a chaplain in the Irish Defence Forces.

Fr Murphy approached the teenager after the case completed, shaking his hand and placing an arm on his shoulder as they spoke briefly.

The boy, and his parents, who were sitting adjacent to the boy, thanked the chaplain.

The 53-year-old Waterford priest sustained severe knife wounds to his arms, but luckily there were no significant wounds to his neck, heart, or main arteries.

The boy was aged 16 when he carried out the attack at Renmore Barracks in Galway city on the night of 15th August 2024.

The attack – videos of which were shown in court – was carried out over a sustained period, lasting some 90 seconds over a distance of approximately 25 metres, before he was eventually apprehended by soldiers inside the barracks.

The court had heard that the boy intended to attack “anybody” serving in the Defence Forces and that the person who first approached the barracks, driving his car, was Fr Murphy, dressed in civilian clothes. He was returning from a swim that night.

The boy had an eight-inch hunting knife, with a serrated blade, in a scabbard strapped inside his tracksuit bottoms.

Fr Murphy stopped at the gate to the barracks when the boy approached him and asked to have a word. When the chaplain rolled his window down, about halfway, the boy lunged at him with the knife.

The priest’s automatic jeep rolled forward, through the gates, which, luckily, were flimsy, but the boy continued to attack him through the window, with the video showing him lifting his hand high and driving it down into the car repeatedly.

The court previously heard the boy had converted to Islam at age 15 and became radicalised online in Islamic State–like material, including videos of beheadings and propaganda from the notorious terrorist group.

Some of the videos were of Mohammed Emwazi, known as ‘Jihadi John’, a British national infamous for atrocities against hostages in Syria.