Cabra man who shot himself in leg gets eight years for attempted murder
A Dublin man has been jailed for eight years for shooting a man over a drugs debt last August.
32-year-old Thomas Ryan of McKee Park pleaded guilty to the attempted murder of 51-year-old Patrick Charles O’Neill on Glasnevin Avenue in Ballymun.
On August 26, 2013, Charlie O'Neill was cycling with a friend in Ballymun when he noticed a man pulling at his trousers.
A shot went off as the man, wearing a baseball cap, pulled out a gun and fired at the 51-year-old who was hit in the stomach.
Charlie O'Neill didn’t realise at the time that the gunman Thomas Ryan shot himself when the gun went off the first time.
The Central Criminal Court heard the shooting was over a drug debt that Thomas Ryan had built up.
Mr Justice Paul Carney said this seems to represent a new form of pernicious crime where someone in the grip of a drugs debt is ordered to carry out an assassionation or decides to eliminate their creditor.
He imposed a 10-year sentence with two years suspended.
