Woman accused of taking €1,000 while husband was in a coma

The case against a woman accused of using her estranged husband’s bankcard to take more than €1,000 from his bank acocunt while he was in a coma after taking an overdose has been adjourned at Drogheda District Court.

The case centred around whether or not the woman had consent to use the card at the time.

The husband of the accused said the problem began in early June 2018 when he discovered his wife was having an affair with their next door neighbour.

The couple cannot be named for legal reasons.

The man told the court he went over to the house and asked his wife what she was doing there. A short time later the man he believed she was having an affair with came down and threw him out of the house.

Asked by defence barrister Michael Miley how he knew his wife was having an affair, the man said he had climbed up a ladder and looked over the fence and saw his wife and the man in question embracing.

He said when he went to the door to confront them the other man said: ‘What the f **k do you want’ and told him: ‘Your marriage is over’.

He said afterwards he went back into his house and then went out and climbed up the ladder again and begged her to come back into the house but the two of them stuck their fingers up at him and pulled the blinds.

The man said a short time later her took a massive overdose of tablets and ended up in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital. His bank cards were left in the house after he was taken to hospital. He said he had been left ‘ traumatised’ by the whole incident.

Asked by Mr Miley what he did after taking the overdose the man said he had no recollection of anything after he had taken the drugs.

Mr Miley put it to him that he had trashed the house with an axe, smashed up his wife’s car and burned all her clothes but the man said he had no recollection of these events.

The barrister said it was ‘very convenient’ that man could remember everything his wife did but couldn’t remember thrashing the house with an axe or thrashing the car or buring the clothes.

The man said the cards were used several times in Drogheda and in Dundalk to make withdrawals at various cash machines. He said the card was also used to book a skip hire company and claimed he had left €1,000 in notes and coins in the kitchen of the house and this was also missing.

Questioned about whether or not he had ever given his wife permission to use the card he said the only time anyone else would have access to it would be if he was working on a DIY project at home and gave her the card to get something in Homebase or somewhere and then she would give it back to him.

He said there had been three transactions with about €1,040 withdrawn from his account.

‘It was taken out without my permission, my credit card and debit card were used without my permission.’

Mr Miley said if the man had previously given his wife the pin number to his card then this was implied consent. He said the €140 for the skip hire was to clean up the mess the man had made after thrashing the house and the reason she had been forced to use her husband’s card was because he had cut up her card and she had no access to her own bank account.

Mr Miley said he believed this case was in the ‘ totally wrong forum’.

‘ This is a domestic dispute between a married couple. There’s implied consent,’ he said.

However, Judge Eirinn McKiernan said the accuser was admament there was not, that he only gave the woman the card to use in specific circumstances.

After a short recess, Inspector Gavin Scott said he believed the matter could be dealt with by way of adult caution. ‘She has no previous and there is an admission,’ he said.

Judge Eirinn McKiernan agreed to adjourn the case to April 3rd to see if it is suitable to be dealt with by way of adult caution.