Man pleads guilty to Securicor robbery
A drug addict who ran through crowds in Dublin carrying a Securicor cash box he had just robbed has been remanded in custody pending sentence.
Stephen Thompson, also known as Stephen Thomas (aged 31) with addresses at both Balcurris Road, Ballymun and Dominick Street, Lower, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to robbery of the Securicor cash box on July 5, 2005 and theft of a jewellery store in The Square, Tallaght, on June 6, 2005.
Judge Katherine Delahunt adjourned the case to November to allow another charge that Thompson is facing to come before the courts.
She accepted that a psychologist's report made "very tragic reading" and accepted that Thompson had come from "an extremely dysfunctional family background".
Garda Daniel Charles told Mr Bernard Condon BL, prosecuting, that a Securicor member of staff was collecting cheques from the Fingal County Council Office when he was struck from behind and knocked to the ground between two parked buses.
Thompson was then spotted by witnesses running off with the cash box, containing €263,000 in cheques and weaving in and out of the crowd on Parnell Street.
He was seen running into the Parnell Mooney public house on Parnell Street, covering the box with a jacket and meeting with a second man, before he left again and headed in the direction of Moore Street.
Gardaí arrived to find Thompson running through the hallway of a building in a lane way by Moore Street.
He stopped under a stairwell and tried to force the cash box open which caused a red gas to be released, a security feature of the box.
Gda Charles said the cheques were destroyed but they were reissued so the council did not suffer any financial loss.
Thomspon also stole €17,000 worth of jewellery from a shop in The Square in Tallaght after he took a number of trays from the display window when he noticed it was unlocked.
He was later seen dumping the trays in a truck that carries shopping trolleys around the centre and trying to make off with the haul. He was stopped by security officers and held to the ground.
When gardaí arrived Thompson was made stand up and a number of rings fell from his pockets. All the jewellery was later returned to the store.
Garda Grainne McPartland agreed with Mr Padraig Dwyer BL, defending, that Thompson "was in a bad way" when he was brought to the station having been left with marks to his forehead and a bruised and swollen arm.
She accepted that it appeared he had sustained these injuries during his restraint by the security guards.
Gda Charles said that Thompson had 39 previous convictions which included larceny, assault, drug dealing, burglary and road traffic offences.
He agreed with Mr Dwyer that his client had a serious drink and drug problem since his early teens.
He accepted that Thompson had told gardaí that he had a drug debt at that time but he was not able to confirm if this was the case.
Gda Charles acknowledged that the way in which Thompson robbed the Securicor box was "opportunistic" and agreed that he had continued to try and force it open even though red gas was spraying all over him.
