TWO CO Roscommon teenagers who assaulted a man with special needs and filmed the incident on a mobile phone were each sentenced to four years’ imprisonment on Tuesday.
During sentencing at Roscommon Circuit Court, Judge Anthony Kennedy described the assault, which was carried out with a bottle, as “vile” and an act of “sadism”. Both defendants brandished knives which they did not use on their victim.
One of the defendants, who was aged 17 at the time of the incident, was convicted of assault and the false imprisonment of the 24-year-old victim at an apartment in Castlerea on November 19th. The other, who was 16 at the time, was convicted of assault and robbery of the victim’s mobile phone.
The court heard that the older of the two hit the man over the head repeatedly with an empty bottle while the other used a mobile phone to videotape the attack. The judge watched the footage before he sentenced the pair. Both defendants said that they were drunk at the time and apologised to the victim.
The judge said that he took their apologies “with a pinch of salt” and the defendants should be “punished and incapacitated from doing the like of this again”. The judge said that “one was as bad as the other” and described their behaviour as “vile in taking pleasure from inflicting pain” on the victim. “Sadism is plain, not just from the victim’s statement but from the videotaped evidence. It is hard to understand how these two, aged 16 and 17, could have sadism in their nature,” he said.
In a statement read out in court by Sgt Mick Byrne, the victim stated that he had suffered a great deal since the incident.
“The night the incident happened I was very frightened. It has affected me very much. I have had my medication increased. When I think about the incident I get depressed and sad, I wish it had never happened.”
One of the males admitted to filming and laughing as the assaults took place, and to waving a knife at the victim. He said he was ashamed of the incident.
The man escaped through a bathroom window. He suffered abrasions to the scalp and forehead. The older attacker was sentenced to four years for assault and four years for false imprisonment with both sentences to run concurrently. The younger of the two was sentenced to four years for assault and to four years for robbery.