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A MAN HAS been jailed for two and a half years for the “insidious and frightening” harassment of a woman at her workplace.
Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard John Behan (53) put the woman, who was the manager of a bookmakers, through “almost daily terror”.
She was abused and threatened by Behan over a period of 18 months and had to be accompanied to her car after work. She has since moved to work at another location.
Behan, of Edenmore Park, Raheny, Dublin pleaded guilty to harassment of Patricia Buckley at the Edenmore branch of Paddy Powers Bookmakers on dates between September 2014 and March 2016.
He has two previous convictions related to assaulting Buckley by throwing a bottle at her. He received a five month jail term for those offences in May 2017.
Behan told the court that he was “completely ashamed” of his actions and apologised. He said he did not know at the time what Buckley had gone through but said he now understood. He said he would never put her or anyone else through that again.
Judge Martin Nolan said the harassment had been “persistent, serious and insidious” and had made life miserable for Buckley.
He said he did not believe that Behan did not know what he was doing. “It seems to me he deserves a custodial sentence,” he said.
Judge Nolan imposed a three and a half year sentence and suspended the final year on strict conditions. He ordered Behan not to contact Buckley or go within 400 yards of her home or place of work for 15 years.
Garda Eoin Kennedy told Pieter Le Vert BL, prosecuting, that Behan was known as a customer at the store over 15 years and had been a problem for a long time.
Buckley and other staff members began a diary in the summer of 2014 in which they kept notes of incidents involving Behan.
Entries in the diary included Behan abusing Buckley in the street and on her way to her car. He would come into the store and stare at her or threaten or abuse her, which could go on for hours.
He came into the store in September 2015 and announced to staff: “There is an awful smell of fear for the time is getting near”. Other staff members recorded similar incidents and described Behan as intimidating and “a bit crazy”.
Buckley had to enlist people to walk her to her car.
One employee said Behan appeared to be “OK” with male staff but had a problem with female employees. They said he also spoke of “mad stuff” like “satellites giving radiation to kids”.
The court heard he would disappear for a number of months before reappearing at the store.
Buckley videotaped an incident involving Behan on the last day she worked at the store on 22 March 2016 . He reappeared at the store ranting on two further occasions that day and Buckley had to be accompanied by three people to her car afterwards.
She saw Behan across the road chanting: “I am coming to get you, I am coming to get you.”
The court heard Behan came in after Buckley had left the store and said: “The witch is gone, I won and she will not becoming back.”
Gardaí were alerted and Behan was arrested in July 2016. He was interviewed by gardai but his answers were rambling and disjointed. He has not come to further garda attention.
In her victim impact statement Buckley outlined that life had become an “almost daily terror” for her during this time.
She said the threats of violence had a huge effect on her life and she had been unable to sleep as Behan led her to believe he knew where she lived.
She described checking around her car in case he was present and being unable to leave work until someone was there to protect her. She said she had suffered panic attacks, sleep deprivation and heart palpitations.
“How one human being can do this to another is beyond my comprehension,” she said.
She told the court she now needed to reclaim her life and not be looking over her shoulder.
Brian Storan BL, defending, said Behan had a history of alcohol abuse but stopped drinking after his father was killed by a drunk driver in 1993. He then began abusing heroin instead.
Storan said Behan, who brought medication to court with him, says he had bipolar disorder.
He asked the court to take into account his client’s early guilty plea and submitted Behan was truly sorry for what he had done.
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Greenhouse gas emissions increase in Ireland is also because of a significant increase in population caused by immigration.
@Damian Moylan: yeah Irish people are carbon neutral those foreigners coming over here with there c02 it’s a disgrace!!
@Damian Moylan: thanks for sharing your feelings. Anything to back them up?
@Damian Moylan: I have never commented on immigration on this site.. but that has to be one of the most stupid things I’ve ever read on the journal, andthatsayssomething. Not surprising that it’s gotten so many likes, we are not short of imbeciles. But I wanted to let you know that you have achieved something really special today.
@: I agree that @Damien Moylan’s comment is badly worded but are you saying that an increase in population will have no effect on us trying to meet the targets that are based on a much lower population baseline figure. Regardless of whether the increase is due to returning Irish, refugees, international protection applicants or people arriving through work/student visas it will have an effect. We all (regardless of where or how we live) use energy, consume food, create waste etc so naturally more people in the country will make it harder to reach the targets set.
Both extreemes, whether they are far right nutjobs or far left open border nut jobs, are disingenuous with the information they provide but an increase in population is going to have an effect on demand for housing, energy etc regardless of the reasons as to why the population has grown.
@Damian Moylan: fair point but it has no argument when you think of the cycle lanes being installed around the country that’ll offset even double the population and probably solve the housing crisis aswel thousands entering the country couldn’t possibly effect the likes of that
Farmers need to move on.Our lakes and rivers need to be cleaned up for future generations.Expensive nitrogen can be replaced by rewarding biodiversity projects.Placing pickets on FFG think ins wont gain any sympathy.And yes I am a farmer myself.
@Willie Marty: If only there were a network of biodigesters around the country to take in excess slurry – like they have in other juristictions including N.I. providing the country with additional power. Its such a pity there arent some forward thinking greens in power …..
@Mindful Muinteoir: biodigesters are not the solution from an environmental point of view.
@Mindful Muinteoir: that would wirk wonderfully if farmers kept the cows inside year in year out , and imported feed from other farms/ countries
But irish farmers tend to graze the cows , which is far better environmentally than chucking them in a shed year round ,
And bio-digesters arent always exactly great environmentally – They dobt run great on just ag waste ,so you need to grow crops. And the biggest issue is transporting feedstock to them , and waste away. A lot of fuel used
If farmers decrease production by 13% then other Eu countries will have to import that 13% from other countries like New Zealand which increases global emissions.
@Damian Moylan: so if Ireland stops making beef, the only other country to buy it from would be New Zealand would it?
@Damian Moylan: or people can reduce the amount of meat and dairy they consume.
@Damian Moylan: Then we might cut exports by 13%. We export a lot of beef and dairy products – you can get Kerrygold pretty much everywhere.
It’s going to be hard to expect Farmers to abide by Rules, when they won’t even put lights on their Tractor Trailers, and why do Farmers expect to get subsidies to do everything, if Rules and Standards are put in place or changed for normal Buisness be they big or small no compensation is given to meet those changes. For example Garages had to abide by new Rules for used Tyre, Oil and Paint disposal that cost Thousands to implement and run, yet no compensation was given by Government/EU.
Land is Ireland is highly suitable for farming given our climate / weather. Ireland produces food other countries cannot and exports most of it. The idea of not using the land optimally seems illogical.
@Damian Moylan: The idea of overusing the land and wrecking our biodiversity is even less logical.
I see the author highlights Irelands low excess death rate during the pandemic as a measure of success albeit the worlds longest and most restrictive lockdown can easily bring such results,surely the surge in excess deaths this year and last must be alarming to these same people who can use these stats as a measure of success,Waterford top of the list-the highest vaxxed on earth
@Shane Doyle: Ireland had neither the longest or the most restrictive ‘lockdown’. Please don’t tell fibs.
@Tom Dillon: Really? Summer 2021 when the majority of europe and UK allowed people dine indoors, we still made everyone stay outside and by the time we did allow indoor dining it was too late and the weather had changed and covid started increasing…..how many countries made people spend 9 euro to eat indoors, or told young people who didnt get vaccinated they could serve people in restaurants they worked in who had been vaccinated but couldnt sit down and eat themselves. The stupid train went off the tracks with some of the “measures” we had and the fact many want us to pretend it was all great and a success is like FF saying handing us over to the IMF to bailout the banks back in 2008 didnt cause any real pain
@Tom Dillon: ya got me Tom china beat us ..we must have dreamt it all up..did we even lockdown
If I were a farmer I think I’d be delighted to have the opportunity to restore the natural world around me. Of course I’d be worried about my family and livelihood too, so compensation would put that worry to bed. I don’t think anyone, farmers included, wants the biodiversity and climate crises to worsen. We need a pragmatic solution that addresses farmer worries, but that primarily ensure we are not destroying our island home for our children.
So we are gonna make the farmers in europe go green but ignore the fact that the EU is literally doing deals with south america to import beef and the rainforests are being cut down over there to make way for it…..Its like eamon ryan telling people to use cars less, while he posed for pics in china while flying business class for his annual paddys week juncket. Hypocrisy knows no bounds
Why does Ireland pick up the tab for bad business decisions, just coz it’s the farmers? What other sector gets so well compensated for its fk ups?
@Chutes: Banking, Insurance, Public Service, need we go on listing…
Hahahaha
Love it when people joke about the Irish being able to govern competently.
The Irish way is to drive the farmers into poverty, so that rest of the Irish hate them for being poor. And of course the Dubs hate them already, because they’re from not-Dublin.
@Chris O’Brien: You should try visiting Ireland sometime and meet the people.
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