Judge calls for resources to be provided to case of man accused of Parnell Square attacks
At the Central Criminal Court on Wednesday, counsel for the prosecution said that the defence have provided a psychiatric report on the accused, but the prosecution is now preparing their own report, which is expected by the middle of October.
Mr Justice Paul McDermott put the matter back to October 22nd, noting that 'serious difficulties' were being faced due to the delay in the case.
'Someone needs to provide resources for this case,' he said.
READ MORE
Mr Bouchaker (51), of no fixed abode, is charged with the attempted murder of two girls and one boy. He is also charged with assault causing serious harm to a care worker and possession or production of a knife.
The incident occurred at Parnell Square on the afternoon of November 23rd, 2023.
In December last year, the court was told that a psychiatrist assessing the accused man deemed it necessary to have further work carried out by a neuropsychologist. In April, the court heard that the expert's report had been made available, but the psychiatrist requested a further four weeks to review matters.
The court also heard that the treating doctor had encountered delays accessing the defendant in prison and with regards to the availability of an interpreter.
In May of this year, Mr Justice McDermott noted the age of the complainants and said the case must be given priority as soon as the psychiatric issue was resolved. He asked that everyone involved, including lawyers and professionals, 'strain themselves' to ensure it gets on as quickly as possible.
When the case returned before the court in June, a senior counsel acting for Mr Bouchaker said that he received the psychiatric report and would make it available to the Director of Public Prosecutions in due course.
In February of this year, the Department of Justice and the courts announced a protocol to fast-track trials involving children. The courts have committed to completing the trial process within one year, where possible, if a child is the alleged victim or perpetrator.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Daily Mirror
an hour ago
- Irish Daily Mirror
'Despair is this morning draped like dark bunting over Barefield'
Despair is this morning draped like ominous, dark bunting over the Clare village of Barefield. The reverberations of the gun shots which ended the lives of Vanessa Whyte and her teenage children, James and Sara Rutledge, 150 miles away in Fermanagh echo in a haunting, incomprehensible volley across the 45-year-old's home place. Even under the July sunshine, Barefield is a place without light, the mood, to borrow from a 1950s Deep South preacher describing the climate of horror during that decade of serial Mississippi lynchings, blacker than a thousand midnights. A family wiped out, endless hopes and dreams expunged, heartbeats stilled in the heartbeat it takes to squeeze a cold trigger. The flag of decency flies at half-mast. Parents, lost for words, hug tightly to their offspring. Vanessa had studied veterinary medicine, a woman with a vocational urge to bring compassion into the world of struggling creatures, to ease their distress. Vanessa Whyte, pictured here wearing a Clare GAA jersey, alongside her children Sara Rutledge and James Rutledge (Image: The Police Service of Northern Ireland) For many years she was a camogie player, most vibrantly alive when she stepped onto a rectangle of grass, hurl in hand, and felt that exhilarating dopamine rush of sporting combat course through the entirety of her being. Her sense of place is self-evident in a beautiful photograph of James, Sara and herself attending a Clare hurling match, most likely one of the games on their run to 2024 All-Ireland glory, a milestone clinched a year to the week before the brutal tragedy. Vanessa stands between her two children, a protective, affectionate arm draped around each of their shoulders. The three of them, pillars supporting the others' lives. A portico of love. All are uniformed in The Banner's saffron and gold colours. Sara wears a Clare training top, her flowing mane held back by one of the headbands which are a fashion item on big match days. James, smiling blissfully, is blanketed by a county flag. Vanessa's county jersey, a badge of identity, is proudly on display beneath an unzipped sleeveless jacket. Though her eyes are hidden beneath sunglasses, her pride and maternal affection are strikingly evident in every pixel. Two decades living outside Clare, but the fire of place still burning at her core. Forever a daughter of the Banner. And though her children were affiliated with GAA clubs in Fermanagh, that they inherited their mother's passion for that beautiful Atlantic county of her birth is self-evident. Vanessa Whyte and her children, Sara (13) and James (14), on the big screen at Croke Park ahead of All-Ireland football final The picture is a sunburst of joy, a chorus of togetherness. It is the music of a family song. An idyllic scene that summons the words of the writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez, "the time when they loved each other best, without hurry or excess." A snapshot that teems with life, yet, this morning, unimaginably, none of the photograph's trio of carefree figures breathe. A hailstorm of death rained down on Maguiresbridge, hard by Enniskillen, on Thursday. The narrow street of our understanding struggles to simultaneously accommodate these two truths - the vitality bursting from the match day freezeframe and the monstrous ending which leaves its three subjects with suddenly stilled hearts. At such moments, the world becomes a sentence without grammar, baffling, opaque, beyond comprehension. Earlier this week, I spoke to my friend Mick Galwey, the beloved former Munster and Ireland rugby player. A Kerryman imbued with the dust of the land that formed him (and a teenage All-Ireland winner under Mick O'Dwyer in 1986), our conversation centred around tomorrow's Croke Park showpiece, the mesmeric David Clifford front and centre of our chat. Hearses carrying the three coffins. (Image: Justin Kernoghan) Mick, a man of emotional depth, speaks with powerful empathy about the sudden death of his friend and teammate Anthony Foley. "Axel" was just 42 and coaching Munster when, without warning, his heart ran out of juice in the autumn of 2016. Galwey had been best man at Foley's wedding. Seven years between them, but they were tight. Like an elder and younger brother. Just a week before his death, Foley had driven straight from a match to Mick's 50th birthday party. "Not a bother on him. In mighty form. A week later he was dead. It took me to a very dark place. You are wondering 'what is this about?' "It was devastating and terrifying to realise you can be laughing and joking and seemingly in full health one day and then, bang, it is all over. Christ." Though the circumstances are very different, the surge of emotion that floored a warrior giant as he accompanied his friend's body home, the cortege driving past their old Thomond Park stomping ground to find the streets lined by thousands, the footpaths wet with tears, will, I suspect, resonate with those closest to Vanessa. The three are to be buried in Ennis, Co. Clare, on Saturday. (Image: Jonathan Porter/PressEye) A huddle of broken family and friends, poor souls who must be adrift in the heaviest fog of grief and bewilderment. Galwey's memories, though stark, poetically express the human impulse to draw strength from the deepest bonds: "You are broken hearted, I mean broken hearted, but you want to grab the guy next to you and say, I don't know, say, 'I love you.'" Sport - notably, hurling - is an essential thread in the fabric of Barefield, a means for a small place to maintain its identity, even as the tentacles of the nearby big town, Ennis, sink deeper and deeper into its heartland. Jamesie O'Connor, the 1997 Hurler of the Year, a totemic figure on Ger Loughnane's class of 1995, the one that ended Clare's 81 year wait for an All-Ireland, hurled for the local club, St Joseph's Doora-Barefield. His brother Christy, the long-time St Joseph's goalkeeper and a decorated sports writer, penned an evocative, award-winning tome about a year in the life of the village centrepiece, a communion of people that was such a part of Veronica's life. Titled "The Club", the book is set against the backdrop of two tragedies in the parish and reveals the central role - supportive, cathartic, practical, distracting, vital - the local GAA branch plays at times of stygian struggle. Vanessa's father, Joe, played on St. Joseph's first ever county hurling winning team in 1954. Her brothers, Steve and Ivor, hurled alongside Jamesie and Christy. It is a familiar tale. Among the more affecting moments of big match days at Croke Park are when tributes are paid to a recently deceased stalwart, their picture flashing up on the big screen as the PA announcer, Gerry Grogan, gives a potted history of their life of service. What gets me right in the gut is when, spontaneously, a burst of applause, gentle at first, then rising in volume yet always respectful, accompanies the brief eulogy. Most people don't personally know the deceased, but they are aware of somebody just like them in their own community. A father, a daughter, a neighbour, who, though their volunteerism or their sporting deeds, improved the lives of others. In that cameo, when applause disturbs the silence, goodness lives. As it indisputably will in Clare and Fermanagh in the days ahead, a sustaining counterpoint to the unfolding horror and disorientation that makes it hard to breathe. No mother will look at the pictures of Vanessa with James and Sara without seeing their own children and feeling the strongest protective surge of something visceral and primal wash over them. Something born in the womb. Tragedies like these are a crossword puzzle in an alien tongue. How can anybody begin to look for answers when they cannot even comprehend the clues. A year ago, on a joyous day, perhaps Vanessa and her children sang along as Tony Kelly inspired All-Ireland glory was accompanied by a deafening Croke Park chorus. "Oh my lovely rose of Clare/you're the sweetest girl I know/the queen of all the roses/and the pretty flowers that grow/you are the sunshine of my life/so beautiful and fair/and I will always love you/my lovely rose of Clare. Those words means infinitely more this morning. Barbarously difficult weeks and months stretch before those who share a bloodline with Vanessa, James and Sara. They will know the profound truth in Mick Galwey's description of broken hearts, in the elemental need to hold somebody close and tell them, with tears filling their eyes and unbearable hurt stabbing at their soul, they are loved.
Irish Times
an hour ago
- Irish Times
Unbroken: Secrets, Lies and Enduring Love - a couple's riveting account through the UK justice system
Unbroken: Secrets, Lies and Enduring Love Author : Mary Attenborough & Michael Gallagher ISBN-13 : 9781785375606 Publisher : Merrion Press Guideline Price : €18.99 The press release says the lives of Mary Attenborough and Michael Gallagher were 'upended' in 1996, but this is an understatement of epic proportions. At about 4am on October 28th, there was a 'deafening thump', the sound of 'steel banging on steel' and a roar of 'armed police' as their London flat was raided. Mary struggled to hide her nakedness and prayed they wouldn't shoot. Michael is hauled away, handcuffed under a shroud and read his rights under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. This riveting account of the fallout from the night is written by the couple themselves and the narrative alternates between their two voices, so we see the raid through Michael's eyes and then Mary's. She asks to see a warrant and is warned to keep her head down before being told the police are 'investigating IRA activity relating to your boyfriend'. Michael's account seems slightly calmer than Mary's at this point. READ MORE Mary is questioned about money and whether Michael is upset that she, a mathematician and software engineer, is the main breadwinner. The fact they've just scraped together enough to buy a cottage in Ireland adds to the suspicion. She is shown the main evidence against her partner, a picture showing him with the keys outside a warehouse where traces of the constituents of Semtex have been discovered. It is later revealed the flat had been bugged and mentions of the IRA had been recorded. There is also an incident where he avoided surveillance in a seemingly accomplished manner. He is accused of taking part in 'mortar attacks on Heathrow Airport in March 1994'. [ Local history: Six books that lift the lid on times past Opens in new window ] The book follows Michael's path through the British justice system, while Mary on the outside works to prove his innocence. Michael eventually gets bail of £250,000 (€288,559), guaranteed by friends and relatives, but this is revoked when a witness appears to change their statement. At trial, all the evidence against Michael – the warehouse key, the fibres within, the flat recordings, and even his alleged training – is convincingly countered, before the verdict is delivered. A revelation that was hard to see coming unless you had some previous familiarity with the case turns the whole chain of events on its head and puts their relationship to the test but you'll already be convinced that the bond between these two people can survive anything.
Irish Times
2 hours ago
- Irish Times
Author Joseph Birchall: ‘Crime fiction can bring us something we don't often see in reality - justice'
Tell me about your debut novel In Plain Sight . It's a crime thriller based in Dublin with a couple of twists along the way. Darcy Doyle is a rookie in the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation, and she's paired up with the once brilliant and now weather-beaten Mick Kelly. There's a serial killer on the Dublin streets, but meanwhile, as they try to catch the killer, Darcy's own secretive past is catching up with her. At the book's core are two very different characters - the keen but green Darcy Doyle and the somewhat jaded and cynical Mick Kelly. Why do you think they work as a duo? They don't realise it at first, but they both need each other. Darcy has experienced childhood trauma, but she can't show any vulnerability in her work as a detective. This is detrimental to her personal relationships. Her job is her prop. Mick's crutch is the drink. In the 1990s you came close to having a feature film made with David Anspaugh, who directed Gene Hackman in Hoosiers. Tell us a little about the story and how the experience ultimately stalled your writing? My wife found my 20-year-old screenplay in a box in the attic (I know that sounds made up!). It was a coming-of-age film called Stuck on Orange about four lads in Dublin who risk everything to improve their lives. I suppose, looking back, being so close to such big success when I lived in California, which ultimately got shelved, turned me away from writing for quite some time. Thankfully, after finding the script, my wife encouraged me back to putting pen to paper once again. To fail, fail again and fail better. If your book were to be adapted for film, who would play Darcy and Mick? Dream casting would be Saoirse Ronan and Colin Farrell - minus the penguin suit. READ MORE You spent years working on a kibbutz. Have you considered writing about that experience? What do you make of Israel/Palestine today? My heart is broken for the people of the region, particularly the children of Gaza who are experiencing generational trauma. An Israeli friend's brother is still being held hostage today. It makes me realise how lucky we are to have had peace on our island for the last three decades. If anything, that still gives me hope. Your family has been living in Tallaght in Dublin for more than 100 years, and the city and its more marginalised are central to the novel. Did you draw on your own experience in writing the book? I had a very fortunate upbringing in Tallaght with two hardworking parents and a loving and supportive family and community, so fortunately, I haven't had any of the kinds of experiences that befalls Darcy. Reading books by investigative journalists such as Paul Williams, Nicola Tallant, Paul Reynolds and Pat Marry helped me gain vital procedural knowledge of the crime world. Irish crime titles seem to be enjoying phenomenal popularity. Why do you think that is? What drew you to the genre? We see so much inequality and transgression in everyday life that crime fiction, and indeed other genres, can bring us something we don't often see in reality - justice. The crime is solved, redemption is meted out and the killer is rightly punished. You left Ireland in the 1990s and lived in France, Israel and California before returning home. How has Ireland changed? We're a more confident people than we once were, more self-aware, and we take pride in who we are, but I think we've managed to retain our unique blend of social righteousness and having the craic. You are the co-founder and director of . Is there a link between entrepreneurship and creativity? You most definitely need to be creative when building a business and not be averse to taking risks. There's more cognitive liberty when writing, though, but the financial rewards are not as good! Well, not yet - maybe if the movie comes off! Which projects are you working on? Reported Missing, book two of the Darcy Doyle series is with the editor and is due to appear in 2026, and book three is about to go off to Poolbeg Press for their initial… let's call it 'appraisal'. Have you ever made a literary pilgrimage? I once went to London in my early 20s to visit 221b Baker Street, fictional home of Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson. I still have the photo! What is the best writing advice you have heard? Read Stephen King 's book – On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft . Who do you admire the most? My wife. (I know, I know!) You are supreme ruler for a day. Which law do you pass or abolish? That all children become the number one priority for every government – their education and their wellbeing. Which current book, film and podcast would you recommend? Colm Tóibín – Long Island (if you've already read Brooklyn ) Mission Impossible – The Final Reckoning The Rich Roll Podcast The most remarkable place you have visited? Jerusalem. Your most treasured possession? My Dad's radio. What is the most beautiful book that you own? A first edition of The Borstal Boy. The best and worst things about where you live? The best things are the location, the community, nearby family, and the view of the Dublin Mountains. The worst is like everywhere in Dublin: traffic. What is your favourite quotation? Motivation follows action. Always. Who is your favourite fictional character? Too many, but Lisbeth Salander popped into my head first. A book to make me laugh? Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. A book that might move me to tears? The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.
