A garda surveillance operation resulted in the arrest of a Dublin transsexual who was suspected of planning to abduct a girl in the midlands, a court heard yesterday.
Tullamore Circuit Court was told that Anthony Carey (35), with an address at Church Street, Clara, Co Offaly, but a native of Dublin, had lived with new-age travellers in various parts of the country. He intended to snatch the girl at a country by-road near Moate.
Carey pleaded guilty to possession of a knife and a length of spiked plastic piping at Boher, Ballycumber, on March 12th last year, the same day he was arrested by gardai.
He also admitted stealing a van which had been left in a car-park by the police.
Prosecuting counsel, Mr Dara Foynes, told the court that gardai were alerted by an acquaintance of Carey who said the defendant wanted to "snatch a child, sexually abuse it and kill it".
Garda Pat Cleary said the man had singled out the girl he was going to snatch and when she failed to turn up, he returned home.
Later that day he went to Athlone in search of another victim but was taken into custody by gardai who were monitoring him. In a statement, Carey denied intending to kill the girl but admitted he fantasised about kidnapping her and bringing her to a Scout hut in the Slieve Bloom mountains near Kinnitty.
The court was told the DPP decided not to charge the man with attempted abduction because of insufficient evidence.
Mr John Phelan SC, defending, applied for bail on the grounds that his client needed psychiatric examination which would not be available in Mountjoy.
Without such reports he could not properly defend Carey, who was a transsexual. He had also been treated for alcohol abuse.
Judge Anthony Kennedy ruled that he would remand Carey in custody until April 27th, describing him as a "public menace".