Intruder who beat man for car keys jailed for six years

A Dublin man who broke into a house and “savagely” attacked the owner to get the keys for a car he later used in a robbery has been jailed for six years.

Kenneth Locke (25) and his accomplice threatened to shoot Stephen Stein through the front door before breaking the door in and attacking him.

Mr Stein tried to fight them off but they beat him over the head with a metal bar until he gave up and let them have the keys. They used the car in a petrol station robbery three hours later.

Det Garda Ronan Coffey said the man suffered a small fracture to his skull and facial bruising.

Locke of Ramillies Road, Ballyfermot, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to aggravated burglary at Ballyfermot Drive on January 21st, 2012. He had 113 previous convictions, including robbery, car hijacking, firearms possession, dangerous driving, criminal damage and endangerment offences.

Det Garda Coffey told Michael Bowman, prosecuting, that Mr Stein had just purchased a new Skoda Superb and left the keys on his bedside locker before going to sleep. He was awoken by the sound of the man kicking his front door.

He put his head out the window and they shouted at him: "We want you to give us the keys to your car or we're going to shoot you."

Scare them off
Mr Stein thought they were drunk and tried to scare them off by saying he had his own gun. He pointed a tyre lever out of the window hoping it would scare them off.

The intruders burst through the door and overpowered him, punching and hitting him about the head with the metal pipe that they told him was a gun.

When the victim stopped struggling and took them upstairs to the keys, Locke told him: “That could have been easier if you’d just given us the key mate.”

Judge Martin Nolan previously described the burglary as “deeply reprehensible”.

Locke’s accomplice, Lee McDonnell (22), Lough Conn Road, Ballyfermot, received a prison term of nine years with two suspended earlier this month.