A 33-YEAR-OLD man who abandoned a three-year old boy at the side of a country road after hijacking his mother’s car has been jailed for five years.
Noel Price, of Kileely Road, Limerick, drove for a mile with the child in the back of the stolen car before leaving him out on a narrow road in temperatures of -4 degrees.
At his sentencing hearing at Limerick Circuit Court yesterday the court heard the 33-year-old had earlier forced the boy’s 12- year-old sister out of the car by jabbing a screwdriver into her back.
The girl, who was sitting in the front passenger seat when Price entered the car, had to jump from the car while it was moving, suffering injuries to her knees.
Her nine-year-old brother who was sitting in the back managed to escape before Price stole the black Opel Zafira with the youngest child inside.
The terrifying ordeal began shortly after 9am on January 20th last outside the Woodview Shopping Centre on the Old Cratloe Road in Limerick.
The children’s mother who was on the school run went into the Centra shop leaving the keys in the ignition of her car.
The woman became aware of the commotion outside when she heard her daughter screaming and watched in horror as her car was driven away with her three-year-old son still inside.
Garda Neil O’Gorman told the court that Price abandoned the boy about a mile down the road at the side of a narrow country road.
Evidence was heard that Price then drove the car at high speed on icy narrow roads becoming airborne on two occasions and narrowly missing groups of parents and children on their way to school. He eventually crashed the car into a tree after gardaí fired two shots to disable the vehicle.
The 33-year-old was wearing a bullet-proof vest and was under the influence of drugs and alcohol when he was arrested, the court heard. He told gardaí he couldn’t remember much about the events but accepted he had taken the car and must have removed the child.
Price was jailed for 10 years in 2003 for an arson attack after petrol bombing a house in Clonlara with a family inside.
Imposing sentence, Judge Carroll Moran also disqualified Price from driving for 20 years.