Teen asks judge for jail term
A Dundalk teenager has been given a jail sentence of four months after he asked the judge at the district court to send him to prison because he found the temptation of drugs on the outside too much to bear.
Aaron Rochford, Sliabh Foy Park, Muirhevnamor, admitted a number of offences that happened in Drogheda earlier this year. On February 4 Gardai in Drogheda received a report about a break-in to a support service for older people at Haymarket. It was reported there was someone on the premises and although Rochford ran off, he was caught a short time later with blood on his hands from breaking the window and property from the premises, including some sterling cash, also found on him.
Rochford also admitted causing criminal damage to car in Drogheda on the same day. He broke two windows in the Blue Bar causing €600 worth of damage and compensation had not been paid.
Judge Alan Mitchell heard how Rochford, who has 34 previous convictions, including for criminal damage, theft, burglary and being in a stolen car, had been in care since he was ten years old.
Solicitor Eleanor Kelly said her client’s father had ‘died from drug-taking’ in 2007 and the defendant ‘is aware he’s going down the same path’.
Ms Kelly said: ‘All his offending is from drug taking and drugs are too big of a draw on the outside for him. He fully accepts that he needs help and wants to engage with a drugs counsellor while in prison.
‘He’s not able to come up with compensation. He wants to change, because if he doesn’t get help now, he knows he will end up either in and out of prison or dead.
‘When he’s clean, he’s a very different young man but, unfortunately at this stage, drugs have taken over’. Judge Mitchell imposed a six month sentence, with the final two months suspended for two years. He said: ‘Normally people are not happy to go to prison’.
Other charges relating to Rochford, including burglaries, were adjourned to Cloverhill District Court on June 29. Inspector Martin Beggy said the State is waiting for forensics to be completed.