Courts

Carer who preyed on six vulnerable pensioners and stole €34,000 jailed for eight years

Precious Moyo (38) developed ‘intimate’ knowledge of victims’ households, helping her to carry out offences

The court heard the pair had no prior convictions. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times
The court heard the pair had no prior convictions. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times
Tom Tuite
Tue Nov 26 2024 - 16:48

A carer has been jailed for eight years after she preyed on six vulnerable pensioners she previously nursed in the Athlone area, stole €34,000 and carried out a series of violent burglaries.

Precious Moyo (38) who lived at the Athlone Accommodation Centre at Lissywollen, Athlone, Co Westmeath, and is originally from Zimbabwe, was sentenced at Mullingar Circuit Criminal Court on Tuesday.

Her accomplice, 20-year-old engineering student Yamen Alhamada, originally from Syria and with an address at Warren Grove, Boyle, Co Roscommon, was imprisoned for six years.

They had pleaded guilty to a spate of burglary and aggravated burglary offences described by Judge Keenan Johnson as heartbreaking and callous.

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“Lock them up for a long time because they are evil,” said one victim.

Judge Johnson said Moyo, a mother of three, had worked for a home help agency for a year, where she developed “intimate” knowledge about the households of the six elderly male and female victims, aged between 73 to 89 and suffering from serious health problems.

Judge Johnson said the offences were callous, breached the victims’ trust and left them isolated, vulnerable and terrified.

He accepted that Moyo was the main offender, saying she had abused her position in a most appalling way. Their crimes happened after Moyo was let go from an agency following complaints.

Sentencing, Judge Johnson said the court had to send out a message. He said the victims were traumatised, adding the pair’s “crime spree” had resulted in permanent life changes for some of the victims, with a number no longer living independently and others in “constant fear”.

He said their crimes damaged the reputation of genuine refugees the vast majority of whom, he said, were law abiding and contributed to Irish society. He added that he did not want people to highlight this case as being indicative of refugees.

Accomplice Alhamada, who had come to Ireland with family to escape the war in his country, claimed to gardaí that he went along with Moyo because she was “into black magic called juju, and he would be protected if he did what she said”.

Judge Johnson also directed that €35,000 from fines imposed in a recent unrelated health and safety prosecution should go to the victims.

The court heard the pair had no prior convictions.

The defence asked Judge Johnson to note their clients’ early guilty pleas, avoiding a substantial trial with about 100 witnesses and further traumatisating of the elderly victims.

In mitigation pleas, the court heard Moyo moved to Ireland five years ago to escape a violent marriage, and isolation from family led to depression and drug addiction, and she “never thought about the victims and what this distorted deviancy would do to them”.

Her father’s death when she was 13 impacted her and there were claims of abuse by older men in her community and serious health problems.

Alhamada had experienced trauma from the war in Syria when he was a child. After moving to Ireland with his family, he performed well in school, played GAA and soccer, and went to college in Athlone.

But he “spiralled out of control” from cannabis and alcohol abuse leading to a €12,000 drug debt.