TWO MEN who duped an 80-year- old man into handing over his life savings of €27,000 after telling him they were gardaí and that his money was not safe in a credit union account have each been jailed for five years.
Thomas O’Brien (20), Cullina, Beaufort, Co Kerry and James Dooley (21), Ballyspillane, Killarney, Co Kerry, both pleaded guilty to making a gain of €27,000 by deceiving the elderly man in Cork city and impersonating gardaí between April 2nd and April 8th, 2009.
The two also pleaded guilty at Cork Circuit Criminal Court to making a gain of €6,000 by deception from a 63-year-old man also in Cork city on March 11th, 2009, when they posed as workmen and asked him for cash, which they spent on a trip to Amsterdam.
Garda Chris Daly told how the men targeted the 80-year-old man when one of them rang him and said he was a Garda superintendent and that his money was no longer safe in the credit union and that he was sending two detectives around to help him to withdraw it.
The man said the gardaí would put the cash into a special Garda account and over the next few days, O’Brien and Dooley got the man to withdraw sums totalling €12,000 from Ballyphehane Credit Union, and €11,000 from the Lough Credit Union.
However, the pensioner’s home help became suspicious and she notified a next door neighbour, who in turn alerted gardaí.
Gardaí arrested O’Brien and Dooley after they went to Ballyphehane Credit Union just as the pensioner was closing off his account and withdrawing his final €4,000.
Gardaí succeeded in freezing an account belonging to Dooley and recovering €8,000, while they later recovered a further €3,000, but the elderly man was still some €16,000 out of pocket with no prospect of getting his money back, said Garda Daly.
Judge Patrick Moran said he accepted both men had pleaded guilty and saved their victims having to come to court, but their crimes had had a huge psychological impact on both their victims.