Ballymun man told Gardaí he was forced into crime over drug debt

By Isabel Hayes

A man who walked into a garda station and confessed to robbing a post office with an imitation firearm has been further jailed for attempting to rob a jeweller’s with a butcher’s knife.

Ian Byrne (41) told gardai he was under pressure from a drugs gang after he racked up a debt for cocaine usage when he injured his knee. The court heard he had previously worked as a forklift driver for Ikea for eight years.

Byrne, of Dane Road, Balbutcher Lane, Ballymun, Dublin, previously pleaded guilty to one count of robbing a post office on Dorset Street, Dublin 7 and one count of possessing an imitation firearm on November 1, 2022. Last December, he was jailed for 21 months for this offence.

On Friday, the court heard that two weeks after the post office offence, Byrne tried to rob John Brereton of Brereton’s Jewellers while Mr Brereton, aged in his 70s, was opening up his jewellery store on Capel Street on November 15, 2022.

Garda Eoin Brady told Derek Cooney BL, prosecuting, that on the morning in question, Mr Brereton had just completed opening the shutters to the premises when he realised a man was standing behind him armed with a butcher’s knife.

This man – Byrne – screamed at Mr Brereton who was holding a shutter pole in his hands. As a result, he was able to force Byrne to back off by using the pole. Byrne then took off down Mary Street.

Mr Brereton was shaken after this event, the court heard. There was no victim impact statement in court.

The court previously heard that later that month, Byrne approached gardaí and told them he was carrying a knife for protection from a criminal gang. He told them he was being coerced to commit crimes, but did not admit to carrying out any specific robberies.

He eventually walked into his local garda station in Ballymun and admitted to robbing the post offices. He was then linked to the attempted robbery at Brereton’s.

Emmet Nolan BL, defending, said his client was a single man who lives with his mother. He had an excellent work history until he was injured and got addicted to drugs, the court heard. He amassed a drug debt and was under pressure to pay it off, the court heard.

Sentencing him on Friday, Judge Martin Nolan accepted Byrne was “in desperate need of money” at the time of his offending. “The only way he could think of obtaining money was to rob and steal,” he said.

The judge noted this was a serious offence, involving the use of a butcher’s knife and a man in his seventies. He handed down a sentence of two and a half years, to start from Friday’s date.