Sex offender ‘threat to public safety’ is given ‘a last chance’

A JUDGE has agreed to give one last chance to a convicted sex offender who poses a risk to public safety. Munir Ghariani, 26, received a suspended jail term last May after he admitted attacking a woman on a street ‘for the thrill’.

At the time, Judge Melanie Greally warned Ghariani that she would have ‘no hesitation’ in reactivating the threeyear sentence if he broke any of the conditions for his release.

Yesterday, the Probation Service brought the case back before Judge Greally. His probation officer, Michelle Richardson, said she had not seen him in person since his sentencing and that a man posing such a risk to public safety as Ghariani needed to present himself regularly to the Probation Service. Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that Ghariani is also charged with breaches of the Sex Offenders Act because of alleged failures to notify the authorities of his address.

Michael Bowman SC, defending, said his client had a background of difficulties but had been taking his antipsychotic medication.

The judge agreed to put the matter back for two weeks and said if Ghariani did not turn up for two weekly meetings with probation officers in that time then he would be jailed.

Ghariani, formerly of Granitefield, Dún Laoghaire, Dublin had pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to robbery of a Chinese woman on Granville Road, Cabinteely, on March 21, 2016.

He has 34 previous convictions, including for sexual assault after he groped a woman from behind as she was taking money out of an ATM. He was registered as a sex offender for that offence.

His other convictions include indecency, burglary and theft. The court heard he was on bail for a similar offence at the time of this robbery.

The court had previously heard that Ghariani became an involuntary patient at St John of God’s Hospital in south Dublin on April 3 of this year.