A bank executive's wife broke down and wept as she told a court yesterday of a kidnap ordeal in which, she said, she struggled with masked gunmen who broke into her house before she was overpowered.
Mrs Joan Lacey told the Special Criminal Court that one gang member told her that she and her children and their babysitter would be shot through both knees if her husband did not do as he was told.
Mrs Lacey, the wife of former National Irish Bank chief executive Mr Jim Lacey, was giving evidence on the second day of the trial of a Dublin man accused of kidnap.
Mr Joseph Kavanagh (38), of Benbulben Road, Crumlin, Dublin, has denied falsely imprisoning Mr Lacey, his wife and the couple's daughter, Ms Suzanne Lacey, at Blackrock, Co Dublin, on November 2nd, 1993. Mr Kavanagh also denied the theft of cash from Mr Eugene Keenan, manager of the National Irish Bank at College Green, Dublin, demanding cash with menaces, and having a handgun with intent to commit false imprisonment on November 2nd, 1993.
The court has heard that a £243,000 ransom was paid from the NIB at College Green after Mr Lacey and his family were held hostage. The prosecution has claimed that Mr Kavanagh was a participant in the crime and not a victim of the kidnap gang as he told gardai.
Mrs Lacey told the court that she and her husband arrived home in the early hours of the morning. "I looked around and there were approximately three men coming running. I screamed and tried to get myself into the house but I was grabbed. They came into the hall. Jim was hit on the head and knocked to the ground. I was knocked to the ground."
Mrs Lacey said the gunmen were dressed in boiler suits and balaclavas. The Laceys were brought into the living-room, where their 10-year-old daughter, Louise, and their babysitter, Ms Tanya Waters, were lying on the floor. Their other children were brought down from upstairs and put lying on the floor.
The children were then taken upstairs and told to dress in warm clothes. They were then tied up.
The gang leader made each member of the family and the babysitter stand behind a chair and close their eyes and he took a Polaroid picture and later showed it to her husband.
The gang leader told her that her only son, Robert, who was then 12, was going to be shot. When she became hysterical, he said he would only be shot in the hand. She was then told to tell her husband that her son had been shot in the hand to convince him the gang was serious.
Mrs Lacey said the children, Tanya and herself were put in a van and driven to stables in Blackhorse Avenue. They were put lying down upstairs and tied and gagged. Mrs Lacey said they were left at the stables all day while the gang listened to Garda messages on their walkie-talkies.
One of the gang told her they would be freed at six o'clock if everything went OK. "If it didn't, we would each be knee-capped in both knees."
Eventually, the gardai came and they were freed. Det Supt Felix McKenna said he met Mr Kavanagh and his solicitor at Terenure Garda station the day after the kidnapping.
Mr Kavanagh told them he had been at the Crumlin Shopping centre on October 15th, 1993, when a man told him that his son had been in an accident. Mr Kavanagh said he was bundled into a van and a gun was put to his neck. He was handcuffed and driven for one to one-and-a-half hours. Then he was put in small room, where he was kept for 12 to 14 days.
He said he was brought to meet a man called Jim and was told he would be driving him to a bank.
The men told him if he did not do what he was told he would be shot. Mr Kavanagh then told of going to the NIB branch at College Green, where arrangements were made to put the money in the van.
The trial continues today.