Church burglary left Dublin parish with €1,800 repair bill, court hears

By Eimear Dodd

A Dublin parish team have told a court that they diverted limited resources that would’ve been used to support their community to cover repairs after a burglary of their church.

James Byrne (45) took around €1,000 from a safe at Our Lady of Lourdes Church, Sean McDermott Street on August 4, 2025.

He also damaged locks and internal doors, with repairs costing €1,800, Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard.

The court heard that a priest arriving to say Mass the following morning found a private locked area at the back of the sacristy ransacked, and the safe open. An office area had also been disturbed, with locks broken.

Gardai found a ring near the safe, which they collected as an exhibit. DNA obtained from the ring matched Byrne.

He was also identified from CCTV.

Byrne, with an address at Parnell Square, Dublin 1, made admissions when he was later interviewed by gardai, identifying himself on CCTV.

He denied the ring was his and said he didn’t wear one. When it was put to him that he’d stolen €1,000 from the church’s safe, he said it wasn’t that much and apologised.

Byrne told gardai that he was addicted to cocaine and cannabis at the time and carried out the burglary to fund his habit and as he’d been threatened.

In a victim impact statement read to the court, members of the Our Lady of Lourdes parish team said that this incident had shattered the sense of safety and the sanctity of the church.

They said that the limited resources that could have supported the community had to be diverted to repair the damage caused.

The parish team outlined feelings of anxiety and fear, that some now look over their shoulders and find themselves locking doors.  They said there is now a “constant distracting worry about our personal safety” and that Byrne’s actions had “deeply disrupted” their lives and strained limited resources.

Byrne has 60 previous convictions, including 30 for burglary and four for criminal damage. He is currently serving a three-year and nine-month sentence, with the final nine months suspended, for other burglaries committed around the same time as this incident.

The investigating garda agreed with defence counsel that Byrne admitted to the offence and that no one was confronted or attacked during the burglary.

Counsel suggested to the garda that this incident should have been dealt with alongside the other offences committed by Byrne around the same time, for which he was sentenced earlier this year. The garda noted that it took time to obtain DNA analysis from the ring as part of the investigation.

A letter of apology and letters from Tiglin and Merchants Quay were handed to the court.

Defence counsel said that Byrne’s addiction “has ruined his life” and left him living in hostels for 20 years.

Byrne is making efforts to address his addiction and has enhanced status since going into custody.

Judge Orla Crowe accepted the defence’s submission that if this incident had been captured at the same time as Byrne’s other recent offending, all would have been sentenced together.

However, she noted that there was no fault on any party and that it was “proper policing” for the gardai to wait for DNA analysis before charging an accused person.

Imposing sentence, Judge Crowe noted that a church is a particular type of premises and a “place of sanctuary” where people go “to look for comfort”.

She said the victim impact statement was “particularly evocative” noting that some of the people who work there say they look over their shoulders when they go in and are afraid of what they might find.

She said they were “very upset” by what had happened.

The judge said that Byrne’s drug problem is “front and centre” and at the root of his offending.

Having considered the mitigation, the judge said she would impose a sentence to run alongside the sentence Byrne is currently serving.

She imposed a two-year sentence backdated to July when Byrne entered his guilty plea.