Previously jailed Dublin businessman avoids extra jail time for watch theft

By Eimear Dodd

A judge has declined to extend the length of time a Dublin businessman serving a sentence in connection with a €1.4 million money laundering scheme will spend in custody after he pleaded guilty to the theft of a watch worth over €15,000.

Wesley Williams (46), of Foxlodge Manor, Ratoath, Co Meath, was sentenced to two and a half years in prison in February after he pleaded guilty to one count of making a gain for himself in the scheme, which took place over a decade ago.

Williams was handed a 20-month sentence after pleading guilty to the theft of the watch on an unknown date between February and June 2012.

Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that Gardaí carried out a search of Williams’ property in 2013, during which they found a safe in a back bedroom.

Williams said he couldn’t open it and had lost the keys. Detective Garda Deirdre Lynn told Fiona Crawford BL, prosecuting, that this was considered unusual and Gardaí arranged for a locksmith to open the safe.

They found the watch inside. Williams previously told Gardaí and his insurance company that the watch had gone missing in February 2012 after he took it and another watch to Westbury Mall.

His insurance company provided a replacement watch, which Williams was wearing when Gardaí carried out the search.

During interview, Williams told Gardaí he didn’t know the watch was in the safe and was embarrassed that he couldn’t open it.

Defence counsel, Paul Comiskey O’Keeffe BL, asked the court to consider all the mitigating features, including that his client had no convictions at the time of this offence.

Judge Martin Nolan said “I don’t think justice demands that I extend his time in prison” and handed Williams a sentence of 20 months from April 9th.

The court previously heard that a garda operation was set up in October 2012, investigating the transfer of €4 million from injured parties in Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands into Irish bank accounts.

The court heard that on October 30, 2012, four transactions totalling €420,000 came from two German accounts into the bank account of which Williams and his co-accused Silvio Rabbitte (55) were both signatories.

The following month on November 9, a further €1 million came into the account from Germany.

Rabbitte (55) received €350,000 after €1.4 million from German investors was transferred into an account he shared with Williams, as co-directors of a company called One Stop Shop Catering Ltd.

Rabbitte, of Woodberry Gardens, Castleknock, Dublin, was handed a two-year suspended sentence in February after he pleaded guilty to one count of impeding the apprehension of Wesley Williams on dates between September 2012 and July 2014.