A MAN who tried to rob a building society while posing as a wheelchair-bound woman has been jailed for this and another attempted robbery.
Thomas Clark (43) arrived at the building society unshaven and wearing a poor-quality black wig. He was being pushed in the wheelchair by an accomplice, Martin Collins (21). Collins had previously made an appointment with the manager on the pretence that a woman he was caring for had been awarded €2.9 million by the State and wanted to invest it.
Det Garda Sgt Peter Woods told Dara Hayes, prosecuting, that the building society manager Michael Doyle noticed the “woman” was wearing what was obviously a black wig when Collins pushed her into his office. Collins left the wheelchair facing the door, which Mr Doyle thought strange.
Clark got out of the wheelchair and produced what Mr Doyle thought was a shotgun. Then he noticed it was a man dressed as a woman. Clark shouted “Get down on the floor” but Mr Doyle realised the weapon was an imitation gun. Collins produced a similar weapon but this was a hatchet made to look like a gun.
Det Sgt Woods said Mr Doyle then shouted at the raiders: “Would you ever f**k off” before telling them to “stop being stupid”.
Collins struck Mr Doyle on the back of the leg, causing him to bleed, before the robbers ran from the building society empty-handed to a waiting car and sped towards Blackrock.
Gardaí arrested them a short time later. Both Collins, Neilstown Gardens, Clondalkin, and Clark, Keeper Road, Crumlin, and Chaplains Place, Clondalkin, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to attempted robbery at Permanent TSB on Lower Kilmacud Road, Stillorgan, on October 20th, 2010.
Clark also pleaded guilty to the attempted robbery of the EBS in Leixlip the following day. The court heard while running to escape gardaí, Clark jumped into the river Liffey and tried to swim across it.
Judge Martin Nolan sentenced Clark to consecutive prison terms totalling six years but suspended the final two on strict conditions.
He accepted Clark was “to some degree institutionalised and has not had the best start in life”.
In February, Judge Nolan jailed Collins for three years for his role in the crime. The court heard Collins had 55 previous convictions, while Clark had 33. Both were drug addicts at the time.