Fearful mum pleaded as raider menaced tot with knife, court told

A MOTHER who woke to discover a knife-wielding burglar making stabbing gestures at her baby son likened it to a scene from a horror movie, the High Court has heard.

The woman told police she pleaded on her hands and knees with the intruder, fearing he was going to kill the six-month-old baby.

Details emerged as two Belfast men accused of breaking into the family home at Stranmillis Gardens in the south of the city last week were refused bail.

Seamus Rooney (30), of Kinnaird Terrace, and Tyrone Boyle (25), of Victoria Parade, are jointly charged with aggravated burglary and possessing an offensive weapon, namely a knife.

Rooney faces further counts of criminal damage to a PSNI vehicle and assault on police.

The woman, her partner and infant son share a downstairs bedroom in the house targeted in the early hours of November 23.

Crown lawyer Conor Maguire said she woke to find two men in their room.

Boyle was standing over the baby’s cot and pointing a knife at him, while Rooney was also armed with a blade and positioned close to the child’s father, according to the prosecutor.

Mr Maguire continued: “(The woman) described to police that Boyle was moving the knife in a stabbing motion.

“She said it was like something out of a horror movie, and that this action was indicated a number of times, purporting to stab the child.”

As the incident developed Boyle was demanding: “Where’s the stuff ?”

In her account to police the baby’s mother described how exposed and vulnerable she had felt.

“She found herself on her hands and knees on top of the covers, pleading and begging for Boyle not to hurt her baby, believing he was going to kill her baby,” Mr Maguire said.

He told the court her partner was also shouting for the men to leave.

The couple, in their twenties, also share the home with the woman’s mother and seven-yearold brother.

Mrs Justice Keegan was told the older woman came downstairs and wrestled with one of the intruders, grabbing the knife before forcing him out of the house.

Boyle and Rooney were arrested a short time later on the nearby Stranmillis Road.

A laptop belonging to one of the victims and nearly £400 in cash stolen from the property was recovered.

Police had to take Rooney to hospital following his detention due to his level of drugs intoxication.

The prosecutor claimed: “During this time he was aggressive to staff and assaulted an officer by spitting in her face. He also hit her in the left eye.”

Denying bail to both accused, Mrs Justice Keegan ruled: “I don’t consider that I could manage the risk in the community.” IT all started as an excuse to skip lessons at school, but now Ulster Unionist leader Robin Swann has made his 50th blood donation.

The North Antrim MLA achieved the milestone as he visited the Northern Ireland Blood Transfusion Centre at Belfast City Hospital yesterday.

Mr Swann’s young son Evan has undergone open heart surgery in the past, and he revealed this had given him an insight into the need for more donors.

“I started donating blood at school and it came with the added attraction of two free periods off class to donate and an additional period to recover,” he explained.

“However, it got me into a good routine and it is in recent years when I became a father that the importance of blood donation has come very close to home, as my son has gone through repeated surgical operations both in Northern Ireland and in England.”