Two men have been remanded in custody after they were charged with a mugging where a 93-year-old woman was knocked and dragged along the ground by assailants who robbed her after she collected her pension from her local post-office.
Damian Fitzgerald (34) and Damian Long (32) were both charged by Gardaí with robbery of the pensioner at Charlemont Tce, Wellington Road on Cork’s northside on November 9th, contrary to Section 14 of the Theft and Fraud Offences Act 2001.
Sgt John Kelleher told Judge Olann Kelleher at Cork District Court today that Gardaí were objecting to bail for both Mr Fitzgerald from Inniscarra Road, Fairhill in Cork and Mr Long of No Fixed Abode but formerly of Ardbhaile, Mayfield in Cork.
Det Sgt Kieran O’Sullivan said he was objecting to bail due to the seriousness of the charges which carry a penalty up to life imprisonment and the strong nature of the evidence in support of the charges as well as the fact that Gardaí fear they might commit other offences if granted bail.
Det Sgt O’Sullivan said that the background to the case was that a 93-year-old woman was walking along Wellington Road at around 4.10pm on November 9th, having collected her pension at St Luke’s Post Office when two men came up behind her and grabbed her handbag.
The woman was knocked to the ground by the two men and dragged along the ground as she tried to hang on to her handbag before her assailants managed to pull it from her grasp and make off with the bag which contained her pension as well as her mobile phone and her house keys.
Det Sgt O’Sullivan said that there was strong evidence against the accused, including CCTV footage collected at four different locations with four separate shots of two men, whom Gardaí had identified on the video as being Mr Fitzgerald and Mr Long.
He also told the court that he was also objecting to bail for Mr Fitzgerald and Mr Long under Section 2 of the Bail Act 1997 as he feared that both accused would abscond and not stand trial if they were released on bail by the court.
Cross-examined by defence solicitor, Diarmuid Kelleher, Det Sgt O’Sullivan agreed that there were no bail conditions that Mr Fitzgerald and Mr Long could offer to meet that would satisfy him to the point that he thought they should be granted bail.
Both Mr Fitzgerald, via video link, and Mr Long in person gave undertakings to Judge Olann Kelleher that they would show up for their trial if granted bail while they also offered to meet any signing on requirements at their local gardai station so as to obtain bail.
But Judge Kelleher said that having listened to both men as well as Det Sgt O’Sullivan’s objections to bail, the court was not in a position to grant either man bail, and he remanded both men in custody to appear again in court via video link on November 21st for the DPP’s directions.
