A man who set fire to a house while a woman and her two young children were inside has been jailed for 16 months.
One of the children was wounded by broken glass while trying to escape from a back window that David Fannin (29) had smashed before starting the fire.
Fannin, of Edenmore Avenue, Coolock, Dublin, told gardaí he was instructed to carry out the arson by a man to whom he owed money.
The court heard his co-accused, who has since fled the country, is the ex-partner of the woman.
A neuropsychologist’s view on Donald Trump: We’re seeing the impact of power on the human brain
NFL’s €10m shakedown of Ireland shows they’re the best-dressed welfare spongers in the world
Unelected Musk holds court in Trump’s Oval Office as he defends efficiency drive
Leopardstown racecourse earmarked for 1,000 social and affordable homes
During the sentence hearing, Judge Martin Nolan said the family “could have been incinerated if things had gone wrong”.
Fannin pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to carrying out the arson at the house in Ballymun and to intentionally damaging the back door of the house on September 24th, 2020.
On Wednesday, the judge said arson was ”very serious”.
“Once a fire starts, no one knows where it is going to end.”
He said the court inferred from the evidence that Fannin was “inveigled” by the other man, who was the “driving force”, to take part. The judge said there was “some level of coercion” involved in Fannin’s criminal behaviour that night, but the defendant “knew what he was doing was wrong”.
“Even though he has problems, he must have known what he was doing was very dangerous for occupants of the house,” the judge said.
He said he could not agree to the defence’s application to impose a suspended sentence as “there must be some level of punishment for what he did”.
The judge imposed a four-year prison sentence, suspending the latter 32 months on strict conditions.
Garda Seán Clyde previously told the court that the woman, who was at home with her four-year-old and 18-month-old children, contacted gardaí to say a man had shattered a window at the back of her house. A second man then began banging at the patio doors.
She ran from the kitchen in fear, locked herself into an upstairs bedroom and rang the emergency services. She identified her ex-partner as the second man, but did not know who the first man was.
Later on that night, she reported that her porch and car were on fire.
The woman and her young children escaped through the back garden.
Fannin has two previous convictions for drugs offences.
