DISTRICT COURT ROUND-UP
From our reporter at Sligo Courthouse
Kilglass man, 70, given driving ban
A Kilglass pensioner has been fined and banned for drunk driving, at Sligo District Court. Seventy-year-old Eugene Coggins, Kilglass, pleaded guily to the offence that happened at Quigaboy on August 26 last year.
The court heard he had a blood alcohol reading of 221mcgs when processed by gardaí.
The court heard he had two historic convictions for drunk driving. Defence solicitor Michael Monahan said the defendant was a separated man who lived alone in Enniscrone.
He had a few drinks in the morning and by the grace of God he did not hit anyone.
The defendant has public transport and will not drive again.
Judge Kevin Kilrane fined the defendant €100 and banned him from driving for three years.
Man who assaulted taxi driver is fined
A Sligo man who refused to pay a taxi driver his fare and then assaulted the driver has been fined €200 at Sligo District Court.
Michael Sweeney, 23, of Molloway Place, Ash Lane, pleaded guilty to charges that he refused to pay Ian Sweeney his fare of €1,200 and to also assaulting the taxi driver at Liscarra Carrick-on-Shannon on May 19. Defence solicitor Tom MacSharry said the case had been put back for the defendant to come up with the balance of €1,000 which was owed to the injured party.
That balance was now in court and €1,200 had already been paid in December.
Sergeant Derek Butler told the court the defendant had got a taxi man from Dublin to bring him to Mullingar.
He changed his mind and then asked him to bring him to Carrick-on-Shannon and then forced the taxi driver into a cul de sac where he was assaulted.
Jail for 40-year-old man who had knife
A Sligo man who told the district court that he was carrying a large chopping knife on the streets of the town because his life was in danger has been jailed for five months. Forty-year-old Rory Boyd, John Fallon Drive, Cranmore, told the court that Sligo gardaí had told him that there was a threat to his life. The defendant, who has 57 previous convictions, was charged with possession of a sharply pointed knife, being drunk and a danger to himself and others and using threatening and abusive behaviour and possession of a crutch.
The court heard the defendant was pleading guilty to possession of a knife and the charge of being drunk, and the charges of using threatening and abusive behaviour and possession of a crutch were struck out. Sergeant Derek Butler told the court that Garda McGuinness was in a patrol car at 3.50am on June 6 when he saw a man at the Bank of Ireland on Stephen Street whom he knew to be Rory Boyd.
The defendant was holding a crutch and the garda stopped to talk to him.
He was drunk and agitated and the garda asked him to drop the crutch he was holding, and he had a knife in his right hand, a large chopping knife which he also dropped.
The defendant was arrested and brought to Ballymote Garda station where he was charged.
Defence solicitor Tom MacSharry said his client was totally co-operative and the defendant believed there was a legitimate threat to his life on the night in question.
There were people looking for him to hurt him and he was in the process of ringing a taxi but could not get one when the gardaí arrived and events unfolded. Mr MacSharry said it was very serious and he knew the court’s attitude to anything got to do with knives.
The defendant was a 40-year-old man who had three young children with another on the way.
Rory Boyd told the court he was at a friend’s house watching a UFC fight.
As he was coming out of the house a car pulled up and someone said: “We are going to get you, Boyd.”
So, the defendant went back to the house and got the knife, and the car was near the Bank of Ireland and went by again.
He was trying to get a taxi and was starting to run when the gardaí pulled up.
The defendant said he had fractured his ankle and that was why he had the crutch.
“I know this is very serious and I am asking you not to send me to jail today and I will comply with all directions of the court.
“I had no intention of using it and it won’t happen again.”
Judge Kevin Kilrane asked the defendant what was the make of the car that was following him.
The defendant said it was a black car with a Northern registration. He added that at that time, the gardaí had told him there was a threat to his life.
The defendant said he was watching the UFC fight in the home of his friend John McLoughlin which was just across from the Glasshouse which was about a 15-minute walk from his home.
He did not know who his alleged threat makers were.
Judge Kilrane asked how did these people know him?
The defendant said he did not know but that maybe someone set him up as there were other people in the house watching the UFC fight that he did not know.
When he tried to go back into the house, he was told to leave and told that he “was not bringing trouble here.”
He said he did not know who owned the knife as it was just a spur of the moment thing.
Mr MacSharry pleaded for his client to be kept out of jail.
He had spoken to the defendant’s family who said he was a very good father, and they were begging the court not to send him to jail, and he would do anything the court asked. Judge Kilrane said the court had a job to do to deal with knife crime and the only way to stamp it out is jail. The judge said he did not accept the defendant’s “story”.
He was on the street carrying a knife at almost 4am.
He did not know who was threatening him.
Anyone that carries a knife intends to use it, at best for defence, at worst as a weapon for action.
The judge noted that the defendant had 57 previous convictions.
“You went to jail before, and you will go to jail again.”
The judge jailed the defendant for five months on the charge of possession of a knife and took the charge of being drunk into account.
He said that knife crime was not going to be tolerated and jail would follow unless there were “extraordinary circumstances”.
Leave to appeal to circuit court was set at €1,000 in the defendant’s bond and it was taken up when the cash bond was presented to the court later.
Cannabis case is struck out by judge
A young Ballisodare man who admitted having drugs for sale or supply to the value of €2,200 had the charge struck out at Sligo District Court.
Twenty-three-year-old Cameron Nairn, Knockmuldowney Park, Ballisodare, pleaded guilty to possession of cannabis, and having cannabis for sale or supply at Union Wood, Sligo, on July 16, 2018.
The defendant had no previous convictions.
Sergeant Derek Butler told the court the defendant was very co-operative and gardaí believed he was “holding the drugs for someone else”.
Defence solicitor Mark Mullaney said there were none of the usual “badges” associated with a charge of sale or supply. There were no weighing scales or lists or phones.
The defendant said he was holding the drugs because he had a drug debt and was under pressure. He said he did it for his own safety and the safety of his family.
At the time he was smoking a lot of drugs and did not make any profit and was no longer in debt. He had no reason to go back selling drugs. The defendant said he had learned from his mistake and there was a lot going on with his mother’s mental health at that time in 2018.
He had been using cannabis and was involved with people he wanted nothing to do with any more.
The defendant had changed his life around, the court heard.
Sergeant Butler said the defendant found himself in a lot of difficulties and was forced to hold these big amounts of drugs.
“Our belief is that he is no longer associated with these people.” Mr Mullaney said the defendant earned €650, and had a new girlfriend who was a steadying influence.
The defendant also had learning difficulties. His father was very supportive but could not be in court on the day, but his older sister, who is a primary school teacher, was in court with him.
Mr Mullaney asked the court for a decision short of a conviction on the charge of sale or supply.
Judge Kevin Kilrane said there were two ways of looking at this case.
One was the background and his relationship with his mother, taking drugs and the need to buy cannabis. He was roped in with more serious dealers whose function is to get others to supply he drugs for them.
The other way of looking at it was that the defendant was a spoke in a large wheel but without the spokes the wheel can’t turn. And without these spokes the operators can’t operate as they can otherwise. Slightly vulnerable people are used to do the work the real dealers will not do, and they use a network of vulnerable people to distribute the drugs and without them the system does not work.
All spokes need to be working for the wheel to turn.
So, a message must go out that people must know that there are serious consequences for handling this type of stuff. A message must go out to the public that people like the defendant play a very important part in the distribution of drugs and it can’t be tolerated.
But there is a human situation and the judge said he was persuaded to treat this as an exception to the normal rule.
The defendant pleaded guilty, comes from a respectable family and found himself in this situation for all the reasons already outlined.
With reluctance, the judge was going to strike out the sale or supply charge but convict the defendant on the lesser charge of simple possession.
He fined the defendant €200 on that charge and ordered that a sum of €250 be paid to both Hope House and White Oaks.