Suspended three year jail sentence for ‘unprovoked attack’

A suspended three-year jail sentence has been imposed on a man who carried out an assault on another man using a knife to inflict injury to the victim’s face and head-butting him.

Christopher McDaid (33) with an address at Hillhead, Castlefin, previously pleaded guilty to assault causing harm to the individual who was exiting a shop in Stranorlar when the attack occurred.

Imposing sentence at Tuesday’s sitting of Letterkenny Circuit Court, Judge John Aylmer described it as an ‘unprovoked attack on an innocent man’. But he took into account the accused’s cooperation with the investigating team, and his early plea to the charges.

The injured party had been emerging from the Mace store in Stranorlar, when the incident took place on April 24, 2021.

After shouting ‘yo’ at his victim, McDaid struck him under the left eye, and he had stumbled, after the attacker had lunged and head butted him. The defendant then produced a knife and began striking the injured party in the face.

The victim ran back into the shop with the accused, shouting at him that he was going to get him and his son and put him in the boot of a car.

Garda Ronan Morris told the court that when a colleague arrived on the scene, the injured party had a deep cut in his cheek under his right eye and also bruising under the left eye.

CCTV footage from the shop showed some of the interaction but not all of it.

When interviewed by Gardai, the accused had stated that there had been a previous incident between the parties, and admitted that he had wanted to get revenge.

He also admitted head-butting the injured party, and using the knife. He had thrown the knife away afterwards but Gardai had retrieved it. In a victim impact statement, read out in court, the injured party said he was ‘frightened and in a lot of pain’ following the assault.

His main concern was for his son, as he believed that the accused had the potential to carry out his threats.

“I lived in fear for many months after the attack,” the injured party maintained.

An aunt and godmother of the defendant told the court he had abstained from alcohol and drugs since and had been attending AA meetings. “He has definitely changed and is engaging with the services,” she told Judge Aylmer.

Defence counsel, Peter Nolan noted his client had undergone three psychiatric admission since the incident, and was a man with pre-existing psychiatric conditions.

Mr Nolan quoted from reports furnished by two forensic psychologists.

Referring to the defendant’s previous convictions, Judge Aylmer said they were of a ‘relatively minor’, nature and the 2021 attack was ‘something of an aberration’.

The accused had not come to the attention of Gardaí since the incident, was engaging with the services, and had attended the White Oaks Rehabilitation Centre.

He had come to court with €2,000 euro as a token of that remorse, money that his family had helped gather for him.

Judge Aylmer said he was taking the ‘unusual step’ of suspending a three years sentence on condition that the accused enter a bond and continue to abstain from alcohol and unprescribed drugs, to involve with the local mental health services, and to go under the supervision of the Probation Services.

In the event that the injured party did not accept the token of remorse, Judge Aylmer ordered that it had been handed over to the Peter McVerry Trust.