Elderly man was asked for €3,570 for unnecessary roof repairs

By Brendan Grehan

A CLONDALKIN MAN who got an elderly man to pay him €3,570 for unnecessary roof repairs will pay the money back, Blanchardstown Court has heard.

Judge David McHugh said he considered the crime carried out by Charles O’Brien to be “despicable” and that in relation to sentencing “everything is still on the table”.

O’Brien, aged 37, with an address at Rosebank Place, Clondalkin, pleaded guilty to three charges of getting a named individual to pay him €570, €1,500 and €1,500 respectively for unnecessary roof repairs at an address at Cappaghmore Estate, Clondalkin, all on a date unknown between March 11 and March 18, 2016.

The presenting sergeant told Judge McHugh that O’Brien and another man had called to an elderly man’s house in Cappaghmore Estate in Clondalkin and told the man that the roof needed repairing when it didn’t. She said that between March 11 and March 18 last, the injured party paid €3,570 over to O’Brien.

She said that at one stage O’Brien produced two rotten bits of wood that he claimed he had taken from the roof when he hadn’t.

Judge McHugh told the court: “I consider the crime to be despicable. It was despicable.”

O’Brien’s solicitor, Simon Fleming, said his client wanted to pay the compensation and did not want to mess the court around.
Judge McHugh told Mr Fleming: “I consider that everything is on the table”.

In response to the solicitor for the DPP, Judge McHugh said he was accepting jurisdiction.

He remanded O’Brien on bail to a date in March for payment of compensation and for sentencing.