A MAN who harassed his ex-partner and her boyfriend because he was unwilling to accept the end of their relationship has received a four-year suspended sentence at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
The man and his former partner Jackie Delaney had four children together. The court had heard Emmett Kavanagh tormented Ms Delaney with text messages and calls and posted two bullet cartridges to her with her new partner’s name on the envelope.
Kavanagh (32), of Elm Mount Avenue, Beaumont, Dublin, pleaded guilty to harassing Ms Delaney and Darren Cullen at various locations by pestering them on dates between February 14th and May 14th, 2007.
Judge Patricia Ryan briefly announced the decision on a suspended sentence, having previously heard the evidence.
During the earlier proceedings, Garda Patrick O’Gorman told Cathleen Noctor, prosecuting, that Kavanagh was in a relationship with Ms Delaney up to 2004. Kavanagh and Ms Delaney then had no contact until 2007, when she started seeing Mr Cullen.
On Valentine’s Day in 2007, Kavanagh showed up “out of the blue” at Ms Delaney’s workplace with flowers and a Valentine’s card which he told her were from their children. Ms Delaney started getting unwelcome text messages and phone calls from Kavanagh and he threatened in one text that he would shoot Mr Cullen.
Gardaí cautioned Kavanagh on several occasions about the messages and he agreed not to contact Ms Delaney any more. He told gardaí he was “upset” when not invited to his son’s Confirmation.
He recommenced phoning her and telling her what she was wearing. He started following her.
He sent text messages telling her “you won’t stop me from seeing my kids”, and that he “would shoot the c*** but I won’t coz he doesn’t mess the kids about”. He started intimidating Mr Cullen and pulling up outside their home, shouting at him “you’re a dead man”.
Pieter Le Vert, defending, said: “It seems Mr Kavanagh wouldn’t let go of the past and when gardaí gave him several chances he denied everything and said it was always someone else’s fault.”
“He began to use heroin to take away from the pain of losing Ms Delaney and his children and this led to a downward spiral,” he said.
Judge Ryan acknowledged Kavanagh had addressed his drug addiction and suspended the full sentence for four years.