A 54-YEAR-OLD mother of 10 has been released from prison after serving 16 weeks of a four-year sentence, for stealing €65,000 from an 88-year-old farmer whom she claimed had crashed into her car.
Kathleen Lewis of Blackwater Heights, Youghal, Co Cork, had been sentenced to four years in jail with two years suspended after she was convicted on 22 of 23 counts relating to the theft of €65,000 from George Berry from Ballynoe, Co Cork, during 2006 and 2007.
Lewis was found guilty of the offences by a jury at Waterford Circuit Criminal Court on February 6th, and was sentenced on May 13th, by Judge Rory McCabe after she managed to pay back just €18,800 of the money she stole from Mr Berry.
The court heard that Lewis had threatened to take Mr Berry to court over a minor car tip in Killeagh, Co Cork, in 2006 and he told how he did not want any trouble and withdrew savings and borrowed money from friends to pay her off as she kept demanding more money.
Judge McCabe said he had little sympathy for Lewis and he believed that she had no appreciation of the gravity of the situation in stealing from a vulnerable elderly man. She was “a thief who engaged in base dishonesty and despicable behaviour,” he said.
An Irish Prison Services spokesman said it did not comment on individual cases and declined to comment on Lewis’s release this week from the Dochas Centre at Mountjoy’s Women Prison.
The Irish Times has learned that Lewis, who would have been due for release in November 2010, with 25 per cent remission for good behaviour, has to sign on daily at Youghal Garda station, have no contact with Mr Berry and return to Dochas each week for review of her release.
It is understood a number of factors were taken into account when deciding to grant Lewis temporary release, including an assessment that she posed no risk of violence.
