Army had to disarm bomb left at bridge

Man, 27, who put bomb containing rivets and pellets under bridge in sligo is jailed

A SLIGO man who admitted putting a pipe bomb in a rucksack and placing it under a bridge in the town has been jailed for a year and nine months at the circuit court.

The viable anti-personnel device had to be dismantled by Irish Army bomb disposal experts after 27-year-old Kyle Jinks, formerly of The Woodlands, Ballytivnan, rang the gardaí to tell them of the location of the bomb. The bomb also contained rivets and pellets.

A SLIGO man who admitted putting a pipe bomb in a rucksack and placing it under a bridge in the town has been jailed for a year and nine months at the circuit court.

The viable anti-personnel device had to be dismantled by Irish Army bomb disposal experts after 27-year-old Kyle Jinks, formerly of The Woodlands, Ballytivnan, rang the gardaí to tell them of the location of the bomb.

The bomb also contained rivets and pellets which could be used as shrapnel.

The defendant told gardaí later when arrested that he knew about the bomb from overhearing a conversation between two men in a pub.

Jinks had placed the bomb in a rucksack under a bridge near Rathbraughan Line on the Old Bundoran Road, the court heard. The defendant pleaded guilty to possession of an improvised device, a pipe bomb, at Rathbraughan Line on July 8, 2017. It was believed that Jinks, who was 23 at the time, did not have the pipe bomb in his possession for a lawful reason.

In sentencing Jinks, Judge Francis Comerford said the bomb had the potential to cause injury but it did not have any accompanying fuse.

The defendant was arrested in December 2017 and admitted that he had the bomb.

It appeared that Jinks had no idea of the rivets and pellets and had no idea of the potential damage it could cause by leaving it in a public place.

It was not his intention for the bomb to cause harm, but he hoped that by reporting it to gardaí that he would gain credit.

Gardaí believed he was not involved in organised crime – his crime was having the bomb in a public place where it could be dangerous.

But he gave the gardaí its location shortly after placing at Rathbraughan Line.

Judge Comerford said it had been suggested that his actions were because he wanted to get the reputation of a hard man and get respect.

But the judge said he believed that Jinks’s motivation was more calculated than that of a Walter Mitty. He committed this crime to get a better result of other matters against him. That was a calculation that was wrong.

The defendant made false allegations that another person that he has a grudge against was involved with the pipe bomb as was a serving garda.

Jinks had subsequently apologised to the garda and admitted that the other person was not involved either, but the defendant still has a grudge against that individual.

Jinks did not place the pipe bomb to cause harm and it did not remain long in the location which minimised risk.

The judge added that it did not matter whether he intended harm or not as being in possession of an anti-personnel device was a very serious offence and he should never have attempted to use it. The defendant was not being charged with making false allegations, but this was an aggravating factor.

The maximum penalty for this very serious charge was 14 years in jail. But this offence was not at the top end of the scale.

But having an explosive device that can cause injury cannot be anything other than a significant offence and cannot be in the lower end of sentencing.

Five years in prison was the term for possession of a firearm, even an imitation one.

However, there was no intention of causing harm and gardaí believed that Jinks was not involved in serious crime.

Judge Comerford noted Jinks’s early plea and that he came from a troubled background and there were “fractures” in his family. There were some instances of self-harm. The defendant was a separated father-of-two.

He had various contacts with the mental health service in his youth before going to jail but he did not engage fully.

The defendant got into petty crime in his early 20s after some family issued.

And he had been in custody for certain periods previously.

The defendant had previous convictions for public order offences, and some petty crimes. He had pleaded guilty to the offences, was in jail since November, and did not seek bail.

The defendant had been seen by a psychiatrist and was on medication, including some anti-psychotic drugs and had ongoing difficulties with mental health.

He was emotionally unstable and had a lack of remorse for his behaviour.

There was no previous of violence and his risk of violence was low.

The defendant had alleged that he had been abused as a child but had not faced up to this matter and needed therapy although there was no psychiatric condition present in him. A pre-sentence report found that he was open to very impulsive changes in the views that he takes of any given situation.

He had co-operated and made admissions but there was no co-operation as to where the bomb came from.

A search of his address showed no proof that he had made the bomb himself.

Owing to his false allegation against a serving garda, an Ombudsman investigation began and that would be a great cause of stress to the innocent garda.

The defendant’s allegations caused stress but for gardaí it was part of the system and something very difficult that they had to face. The judge said the defendant’s care should be continued in jail. The judge jailed the defendant for 42 months but suspended the final 21 months for three years. The terms of the suspension were, that on his release, he was bound in his own bond of €100 to keep the peace, attend anger management and abstain from drugs and alcohol.

He was also to be placed under the care of the Probation Service for a year.