A JUDGE yesterday remarked on the obvious fear of witnesses who declined to give evidence before he imposed a 10-year jail sentence on a man for stabbing his victim so viciously that his intestines were left trailing from his wounds.
Darren Duff (36) of Doon Court, Poppintree, Ballymun, was convicted by a jury on July 29th this year of causing serious harm to Stephen McCann by stabbing him, on July 28th, 2001, at Hillcrest Way Estate, Lucan.
Judge Frank O'Donnell in the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court said he was not surprised to hear that Mr McCann had declined to make a victim impact statement.
"I watched him and the other witnesses decline to give evidence in the trial having initially given very damning statements to gardaí. These young people all gave the same message with fear written all over their face and embedded in their composure," Judge O'Donnell said and added, "and I have no doubt as to the source of their fear".
He said the fact that Duff had gone into a house to pick up a knife showed "malice and forethought with the intent to cause serious harm".
"You caused an incalculable amount of harm, so much so that seven years after the event it is still with Mr McCann," Judge O'Donnell said.
He told Duff that his 23 previous convictions, which included a nine- and a five-year sentence for two armed robberies, showed "a consistent disregard for any strictures placed on him by society".
Judge O'Donnell sentenced Duff to 10 years in prison after saying that "without the criminal justice system you would have got away scot-free".
The victim and 10 other civilian witnesses refused to testify at the 11-day trial before the statements they made to gardaí in 2001 were read into evidence by prosecuting counsel Melanie Greally, following legal argument in the absence of the jury. They all agreed with Ms Greally that their statements had been made voluntarily.
"I don't want to give evidence in this trial. I just want to move on with my life and forget about everything," Mr McCann said after taking the oath in the witness box on day one of the trial.
A procession of other civilians followed with each of them, after taking the oath, using similar words when refusing to give evidence: "With due respect to the court, I do not wish to give evidence; I just don't wish to give evidence today".
Defence counsel Patrick MacEntee was told by several of them that nobody had asked them to decline to give evidence. One replied "no" when Mr MacEntee asked her: "Did you agree your choice of words with anyone?"
Garda Geraldine Ennis told prosecuting counsel Ms Greally that Mr McCann needed surgery to repair bowel and colon perforations caused by the stabbing. He had since made a full recovery.
The jury heard that Mr McCann had been talking to friends outside a house in Hillcrest Way when he intervened in a dispute between Duff and a woman.
There was a brief struggle which ended when Mr McCann's friend pulled him away from Duff who then armed himself with a knife from the house, ran after Mr McCann and stabbed him in the stomach.
Duff moved off but continued to make threats at everyone before he drove off. He presented himself at the local Garda station in September that year but refused to stand in an identification parade.
Garda Ennis agreed with defence counsel Patrick MacEntee SC that Duff had spent some of his childhood in Clonmel Industrial School in Tipperary but accepted that he had not been in "substantial trouble" with the gardaí since his release from prison in 1996.
She said she was not aware that Duff had opened a children's clothing store in Swords.
Mr MacEntee told Judge O'Donnell that he could not defend the use of a knife on another human being but asked the court to accept that it was "an isolated incident".
Duff's father drowned in the River Shannon on July 21st, 1995, near Limerick following the armed robbery of £10,000 from the AIB Bank at Castletroy. Tony "Boss" Duff drowned after he was carried downstream after he dived into the Shannon at Clondarra following a five-mile chase by gardaí.