Portlaoise Courthouse

Gardaí who raided a house in Emo where a couple were holding a party found a quantity of cocaine on the property.

Portlaoise District Court heard recently that, on foot of a search warrant, gardaí entered the house by forcing the front door. Inside they encountered a man and his girlfriend, who had been partying for several days. And following a search they found cocaine valued at €825.

Arising from the incident the 25-year-old man pleaded guilty to possessing cocaine for his own use and possessing the drug for sale or supply on 9 July last year.

The court heard that the former civil servant had no previous convictions.

The defendant’s solicitor Josephine Fitzpatrick told Judge Andrew Cody: “There’s a bit of a background to this. He has produced an impressive folder on himself and has self-referred to a GP for his issues.”

She said that her client, who turned 25 the day before his court appearance, now works as a sports and fitness instructor in a local hotel.

Judge Cody said that he would study the folder folder during a break in the day’s proceedings.

When he returned after the break, Judge Cody said to Ms Fitzpatrick: “You can give him back his ‘This Is Your Life’ folder.”

He said: “I have a niggle about this case. It was by way of a search warrant. It was not as though it was somebody walking down the town with drugs. It was €652 worth of cocaine.”

Ms Fitzpatrick suggested to Judge Cody that if her client contributed to the court poor box that he might consider striking out the case.

Judge Cody said that while not deciding one way or the other how he is going to finalise the case he stated: “If somebody can afford €800 worth of cocaine for a party, he might well be able to contribute €2,000 to the court poor box.”

The case was adjourned until 14 September.

*Names of defendants in Portlaoise District Court cases are printed in the Laois Nationalist newspaper that is available in your local shop or in our online edition here.