Clondalkin man with 190 previous convictions to be sentenced on dangerous driving charges

By Declan Brennan

A MAN with 190 previous convictions will be sentenced next May for driving dangerously during a high speed chase with gardai.

Dean Joyce (24), with an address in Rowlagh Park, Clondalkin, was convicted last month after a second trial. The jury in his first trial was discharged after a juror fell asleep 15 minutes into the trial.

Joyce had pleaded not guilty to 11 charges, including endangering gardai by driving his car into a garda van, four counts of dangerous driving and possession of stolen property in Ballyfermot and Clondalkin on March 3, 2015.

He had also pleaded not guilty to driving without a licence, driving without insurance, possession of a boxcutter that was used in a burglary, criminal damage of a garda van and failing to stop for gardai on the same date.

During the trial Judge Karen O’Connor directed that Joyce be found not guilty of the offence of endangerment. The jury later convicted him of all other counts. 

Garda Sergeant Ronan McDermott told Garret Baker BL, prosecuting, that he was in an unmarked patrol car when he spotted a car driven by Joyce breaking a red traffic light.

Garda McDermott said gardai activated the sirens but Joyce failed to stop and a high-speed pursuit began. During this chase Joyce drove the car through red lights, on the wrong side of the road and in the wrong direction around a roundabout.

Joyce’s car collided with a garda van at the Blackditch Road in Ballyfermot, causing €1,500 worth of damage. The car then mounted a footpath and stopped in a nearby housing estate.

Joyce ran off but was arrested. Gardai searched the car and found a boxcutter knife, gloves and stolen property, including laptops, an iPad, a flatscreen television and keys to another car.

Garda McDermott testified that Joyce’s previous convictions included theft, criminal damage, robbery and using or possessing a mobile phone in prison. He has over 70 convictions for road traffic offences, including driving without insurance.

Pieter LeVert BL, defending, said his client began abusing drugs and driving stolen cars at an early age. His parents died when he was in his teens and his grandparents raised him after that.

Counsel said he began dabbling in alcohol and tablets but this progressed to a cocaine habit.

Joyce was recently jailed for other offences and his time in prison has been “the making of him,” counsel said.

Judge O’Connor remanded Joyce on continuing bail to May next for sentence. She also ordered a Probation Services report. She told Mr LeVert to make clear to his client “the jeopardy he is in”.