Dubliner Austin Byrne (38) was jailed for three years after a member of the Garda Síochána apprehended him with a telephone box under his jacket which was later found to have been stolen.
By Brian Canty
A Dublin man who was caught cycling the wrong way down a city centre street with a stolen phone box under his arm has been jailed for three years.
Thirty-eight year old Austin Byrne of Townsend Street, close to Trinity College, had kicked the now defunct phone box off an office building on Lombard Street and proceeded to make off with it.
But his luck ran out when a member of the Garda Síochána spotted him pedalling erratically and apprehended him.
After being arrested it later emerged Byrne was well-known to the Gardaí and had a staggering 58 previous convictions, including 15 burglaries.
Advertisement
Related News
He, with the help of a friend, was previously arrested after also getting caught red-handed stealing an iPad, a laptop computer and a watch from a house on Haddington Road, also in the city.
The latter happened while Byrne was out on bail.
Prior to those, Byrne pleaded guilty to burglary from a Pearse Street office block and possession of stolen property on February 11, 2015 and burglary at Percy Lane on April 11, 2015.
Judge Martin Nolan said Byrne was either a “very incompetent or very unlucky burglar” who was caught by Gardaí immediately after both offences.
He imposed two sentences of 18 months which are to run consecutively.
Topics
