A man charged with attempting to murder three children on Dublin’s Parnell Square in late 2023 is fit to stand trial, a judge has ruled.
The trial at the Central Criminal Court has been fixed for June 8th.
In his decision on Friday regarding Riad Bouchaker’s fitness to plead and stand trial, Judge Tony Hunt said this was a “finely balanced” matter.
While satisfied Bouchaker has cognitive limitations, he held that, once he is provided with certain accommodations including an Arab-speaking intermediary, he is currently fit to plead, instruct lawyers, mount a defence, challenge jurors and stand trial.
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The matter could be kept under review as the trial progresses, the judge said.
Noting young people are involved in the matter, he said an early trial was desirable.
He fixed a trial date for June 8th but said the matter could be mentioned on May 21st. He was told by senior counsel Karl Finnegan, for the Director of Public Prosecutions, that the trial was likely to last two to three weeks.
Bouchaker (52), a native of Algeria of no fixed abode, was in court for the ruling. He is charged with the attempted murder of two girls and one boy, and with assault causing serious harm to a care worker at Parnell Square East on November 22nd, 2023.
He is also charged with three counts of assault causing harm to two other children and a passerby who had intervened to assist, and one count of the production of a knife.
His lawyers had applied to Hunt to have Bouchaker held unfit to stand trial. The DPP opposed that application.
The parties agreed no one is arguing for the defence of not guilty by reason of insanity.
At a previous hearing, a consultant forensic psychiatrist called as an expert witness by the defence said Bouchaker has a complex medical history, had surgery on his brain for a benign tumour in 2021 and suffered a brain injury “in the course of members of the public intervening” on the day of the alleged offences. His only possible destination in the medium to long term would be at the Central Mental Hospital, she said.
Bouchaker has a mental disorder – moderate dementia – and, because of that, is unfit to plead and to stand trial, she said. His level of dysfunction would be beyond what any intermediary or support person appointed to assist him could do, she said.
A consultant psychiatrist called by the prosecution said, despite Bouchaker having a serious neurocognitive disorder, he could be accommodated at trial, where questions can be repeated and made more simple.
He said Bouchaker understands he is charged with a serious offence, is capable of entering a plea and instructing his solicitors and understands the difference between a guilty and not guilty plea.
The psychiatrists and the judge also viewed videos of Garda interviews with Bouchaker.
In his ruling, the judge noted the onus of proof in this application was on the defence.
Expert evidence was “not automatically determinative” and the decision on fitness to plead and stand trial was ultimately for the court, with assistance of expert opinion.
He said he preferred the evidence of the prosecution psychiatrist. Based on that evidence, and the Garda interviews, he held that Bouchaker was fit to stand trial, with accommodations. The interviews were the “most objective yardstick” available to decide the issues in this application, he said.
