A MAN was given a five-year sentence yesterday for staging his own “hoax” kidnapping in a failed attempt to extort €50,000 from his father.
Liam Ward (32), with addresses at Rowan Heights, Drogheda and Meeting House Lane, Mullingar, had the final two years of his sentence suspended at a sitting of Athlone Circuit Court yesterday.
Ward – who has been addicted to drugs since he was 12 – was tried and found guilty of “demanding money with menaces” from William Ward snr at a sitting of Mullingar Circuit Court last Friday.
Outlining the State’s case ahead of sentencing, John Hayden, counsel for the prosecution, said Ward’s sister Brenda had contacted gardaí in Tallaght on February 14th, 2007. She had been given two photographs of her brother “showing him bound and gagged and with a shotgun to his head”. The pictures had been accompanied by a note claiming Ward would be killed if €50,000 was not handed over.
From the outset gardaí were looking at two possibilities, Mr Hayden added. They thought it might be a genuine kidnapping but they also felt Ward – who was a known drug user – might have been involved.
Gardaí set up surveillance at a number of locations and observed Ward getting out of a car and paying for fuel at a filling station near Dublin airport.
He did not appear to be under duress when observed and later that evening gardaí arrested him along with another individual.
Liam Ward told the court he was now off drugs and doing well. He apologised to his family, the court and the Garda Síochána for all of the trouble he had caused.
He expressed remorse “for the hurt I caused my family” and said: “I just apologise to my family. You know, it’s just the last thing I wanted to do.” A victim impact statement from Ward’s father and sister was read out in court. His family described the events of February 14th, 2007 as a “nightmare”.
However, they said they believed “without the influence of drugs and peer pressure” in his life, “this would never have happened. We would like the court to be as lenient as possible in sentencing Liam. At the end of the day Liam is our son, our brother.”
Judge Tony Hunt commended Mr Ward’s father and sister, calling them “fine, upstanding, hard-working and conspicuously decent people”. Describing the family as very dignified, Judge Hunt said: “Even after what happened last week his family are able to say he is their son and brother.”
The offence before the court was not a reflection on the family but rather a reflection of the “depths people will fall” when taking heroin, he said.
During his trial last week, it had transpired Ward’s late mother had been given an infected blood transfusion after his birth and had developed hepatitis C. She had received a large settlement. Noting Ward’s history of drug abuse, Judge Hunt said he was “not surprised his mother had the good sense to not give him anything” as it would “have been immediately squandered on drugs”.