More court reports in brief.
Court awards €300,000 to abuse victim
A Co Galway man was yesterday awarded €300,000 damages by the High Court for sexual abuse he suffered while at a national school in the county almost 40 years ago.
The man, who is now 46, was abused over a three-year period by a former religious brother at the school. In the High Court yesterday Mr Justice Richard Johnson awarded the man damages of €300,000 to include the loss of job opportunity and earnings.
The judge said the man was continually sexually abused by the brother from 1969 until he left the school in 1972 in a classroom in the presence of other people and in a boiler room at the school. The judge said that the man was "extremely psychologically traumatised" by the abuse.
He said the man was so traumatised that he was unable to talk to anyone about it until the late 1990s when he made a complaint to the Garda but was so traumatised that he was unable to give evidence in court.
Judge gives a dressing-down
Judge Aeneas McCarthy told a Polish interpreter at Galway District Court yesterday that she was inappropriately dressed for appearing before his court in a professional capacity.
The young woman, who was wearing tight, low cut jeans and a skimpy top, which left her midriff exposed, had been assigned to the court in an official capacity to interpret for Polish defendants who came before the court.
"At the risk of sounding prudish, I think you are inappropriately dressed for this court bearing in mind you are here in a professional capacity," the judge admonished the young woman. She made no reply.
Four years for guns offence
A man caught transporting stolen guns for a Finglas-based criminal gang has been jailed for four years by Judge Michael White at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
Kieran Counihan (22), of Fassaugh Road, Cabra turned away from a routine Garda checkpoint on the Naas Road but was followed and stopped by gardaà who recovered five weapons and ammunition from his car.
Garda Frank Lambe said Counihan claimed he had bought the car in Cork and didn't know the three double-barrelled and one single-barrell shotguns, along with a .22 rifle and ammunition were in it.
Counihan pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of the guns knowing they had been stolen, having them for an unlawful purpose and with driving without insurance on November 4th, 2004.
Mother jailed over €274,000 drug find
A Nigerian single mother-of-two who was caught with €274,000 worth of cocaine, has been given a five-year sentence by Judge Katherine Delahunt at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
Vivian Denibo (28). of Abiona Street, Faldu, Lagos had swallowed 93 pellets of the drug and a further three packages were found in the lining of her suitcase. She pleaded guilty to possession of the drugs at Dublin airport on August 6th last.
Judge Delahunt said she accepted garda evidence that Denibo did the drugs run because she was living in poverty in Nigeria and was very naive but added: "At the end of the day it was a commercial venture".
She suspended the last 12 months of the sentence.