Does the State know what it is doing with young criminals? One 17-year-old youth had accumulated almost 80 convictions when he was sent to St Patrick's, reports Carol Coulter, Legal Affairs Correspondent
Two weeks ago a 17-year-old youth was convicted of robbing a security van in Dublin. Before he was sentenced his record of previous convictions was read out. They numbered 76 between September 1999 and February 2002. Yet until the end of last year he had never served a day in detention.
His story (and he is a separate case from the one reported on page four today) is another indictment of the juvenile justice system. But it is also an indictment of the absence of social supports for youths like him who get into trouble with the law.
One of four children, he comes from a disadvantaged family in a disadvantaged area. He grew up in the inner city without a father, who died when he was young. His mother suffers from severe ill health, and is rarely seen out of doors.
The adult male who could have served as a role model is his uncle. This man has a number of convictions for rape, of both males and females, and a long police record for serious violent crime. He often accompanied his nephew to court, as has an aunt who lives in the suburbs.
The boy was in trouble with gardaí from a young age, mainly for throwing stones and being generally disorderly in the street. His relationship with gardaí was poor.
He then became involved in petty crime, larceny and receiving stolen goods. He was arrested and failed to appear in court. His first court appearance came in September 1999 within weeks of his 14th birthday. He was convicted of three counts of larceny and one of failure to appear in court and sentenced to one month's detention in Oberstown House for young offenders in Lusk, Co Dublin.
But, as so often happens, there was no room for him there. So when he was driven out there, gardaí were told there was no room. They brought him back to the city and released him back into the environment that was turning him into a criminal.
The following May he faced 10 charges, many of them related to public order. He had failed to leave a premises or area when told to by gardaí, he had been involved in breaches of the peace, and he had done a bit of robbing and attempted stealing of cars. He had also failed to turn up in court on two occasions since his previous appearance. He was bound over to be of good behaviour for two years.
Clearly undeterred, he was in court again 2½ months later, this time facing 22 charges in two appearances in the same day. By now they were a bit more serious, and included a number of charges of assault, both common assault and of members of the Garda. He had started stealing cars.
He was sentenced to two years' detention in Trinity House detention centre for young offenders, also in Lusk. Again he was driven there, only to be turned away because there was no room. That afternoon he had his second court appearance. The judge put him on probation for 12 months.
It was 11 months before he was in court again, but he had accumulated seven charges in that time. Five were for larceny, another for criminal damage and once again he was charged with taking a car. Again he was sentenced to two years in Trinity House. Again there was no room for him.
The same thing happened later that month, when he faced four charges of the same nature. Again he received two months' detention in Trinity House, and again he was turned away and put back on to the streets. Later that same month he was in court again on seven charges, most of them breaches of the peace. This time the judge did not even attempt to sentence him to a period of detention, but put him on probation for 12 months.
"The judge is aware there is no room. The probation officer is aware there is no room. But they all have to go through the motions," one garda said.
He was now just short of 16, the age at which he could be sent to St Patrick's Institution, which is a penal institution. Because the other institutions are for children under the school-leaving age, they are meant to be essentially educational, though they are also places of detention.
But there are not enough places in them for all the children who come before the courts, and this situation has been going on for years. Further, the pressure from the High Court to find places for disturbed children who have committed no crimes has meant such children have sometimes been sent there, further reducing the number of places available for convicted children. So, although this boy had accumulated 57 convictions in two years, he had never spent a day in one of the places that could, perhaps, have halted his descent into a life of crime.
On October 22nd, 2001, he committed the crime that brought him to court earlier this month, when, along with an older youth, he robbed a Securicor van of £37,000. He had just turned 16. He was arrested a week later and charged.
Gardaí opposed bail, but it was granted by Judge Catherine Murphy on six strict conditions. These included him staying in a centre for youths in Ballyjamesduff, Co Cavan, five days a week. At weekends he was to avoid the city-centre and stay with the aunt in a Dublin suburb. He was told that breach of the bail conditions would lead to bail being revoked.
Within weeks he was picked up by gardaí in the city-centre, in possession of thousands of pounds worth of designer clothes. Gardaí suspected they had been bought with the proceeds of the robbery. He was then detained for breaching his bail conditions.
Meanwhile, his string of convictions continued to mount up. In November he received 19 more, and was sentenced to 22 months' and nine months' detention. This was followed in February with two convictions and another 28 days' detention.
Last December was the first month he served of an actual sentence, though he was in detention anyway on remand for the robbery. He was sentenced to four years in St Patrick's for this crime, with one year suspended.
No one thinks that this will mean an end to his criminal activities. Gardaí say he had been hanging out with older youths, many of them already professional criminals. They say he has a "mature criminal mind" and shows no fear of the criminal justice system.
But his probation officer painted a different picture when he was first charged with the robbery last November. She described a young man who felt "embattled" by his history with gardaí, and who was under peer pressure. In the four weeks he had spent in the Cavan centre he gave absolutely no trouble, and she expressed the hope this would provide "something solid" for him.
There are only 28 places for young offenders in Dublin. According to gardaí, there are about 100 repeat offenders coming before the Children's Court. They know a sentence will be meaningless, as there is unlikely to be room for them in a detention centre.
Those working with such children acknowledge that the lucky ones who do get in make a lot of progress in these institutions. But there is no support for them when they are released, and they slip back into the environment that led them to offend in the first place.