A 25-yr-old Dubliner has been sentenced to three years in prison for a robbery in which he grabbed a taxi driver by the neck from the back seat and threatened to have him stabbed.
Lee Hand, with an address at The Beacon, Royal Canal Park in Dublin, appeared before the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on Thursday charged with robbing the driver of his taxi, cash and mobile phone after being dropped off at his destination on 24 September 2024, reports Breaking News.
He pleaded guilty to carrying out the robbery at Church Terrace in Finglas.
He also pleaded guilty to a separate robbery carried out a year earlier on 3 October 2023 at Supervalu in Rathborne, in which he made off with €200 in cash, reports Breaking News.
Detective Garda Gary Moore told the court that a taxi had been called to another building in Royal Canal Park that afternoon and collected the accused along with another man.
Both men sat in the back seat as the driver brought them to Finglas, reports Breaking News.
They asked the driver if he had change of €50, and when he took out his wallet, Hand grabbed him by the neck from behind. When the driver tried to break free, the grip tightened.
His accomplice took the driver’s wallet and €30 in cash from his hand, as well as the ignition key, and both men demanded the dash cam, reports Breaking News.
The court heard he handed it over in fear for his life.
The men also took his mobile phone and ordered him out of the taxi, after which the accused got out too, covered his face with his jacket and told the driver that the other man was going to come out and stab him, reports Breaking News.
Another car then came along and interrupted the robbery. Hand got back into the taxi, and his accomplice drove them both away.
Hand was spotted in another vehicle in Finglas the following day, and the taxi was later found in a car park at Royal Canal Park, reports Breaking News.
Detective Garda Alan Barry told the court that in the earlier robbery, Hand had accompanied a woman into Supervalu, and when a shop assistant opened the till to serve her, he went behind the counter, nudged the assistant aside and took the money.
Although CCTV footage showed him carrying a screwdriver at the time, he had not produced it and the injured party was unaware of it, reports Breaking News.
The court heard Hand had eight previous convictions, including for assault causing harm and misuse of drugs.
His barrister, OisÃn Clarke BL, said his client had never known his father and that his mother had struggled with substance abuse issues throughout his life, reports Breaking News.
She died from an overdose in September 2021, and it was the accused who found her.
Counsel said this had been extremely traumatic for the then 21-year-old, and that his offending prior to that point had been modest, but that this had been the event that pushed him into serious criminality, reports Breaking News.
He subsequently began heavily abusing cocaine and accumulated debt.
Judge Orla Crowe acknowledged Hand came from a difficult background but now had family support, with two aunts attending court for him, reports Breaking News.
She said his crimes had to be marked with a custodial sentence but that she would build in rehabilitation to give him the best possible chance.
She imposed a sentence of two years and three months for the Supervalu robbery and a concurrent three years and nine months for the taxi robbery, suspending the final nine months for two years and placing him under probation supervision for one year post-release, reports Breaking News.
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