Emergency workers tell Bouchaker trial of chaos and injuries in Parnell Square

By Bairbre Holmes, Press Association

Emergency workers have told a court how they witnessed scenes of chaos and treated serious injuries when they arrived at Parnell Square in Dublin in the wake of an alleged attempted murder.

The Central Criminal Court in Dublin has heard multiple children and an adult were injured in the incident, including a girl who is now in a wheelchair and non-verbal.

Riad Bouchaker, aged 52 and of no fixed address, is charged with the attempted murder of two girls and one boy, and assault causing serious harm to an adult, at Parnell Square East in Dublin City on November 23rd 2023.

Bouchaker is also charged with assaulting three other people, and with producing a 36cm kitchen knife.

He has pleaded not guilty to all eight charges.

On the seventh day of the trial, the jury of nine men and three women heard from three witnesses who all described what they witnessed that day as “chaotic”.

The two firefighters and one Garda outlined how they responded to the incident and treated injuries to a young child and a woman, now known to be childcare worker Leanne Flynn.

They also outlined the condition of a man on the scene, defendant Bouchaker.

Brian Mulvaney, a fire fighter with Dublin Fire Brigade attached to Tara Street fire station, described how his crew were en route to Henry Street when they heard about an incident at Parnell Square on their radio and he made the decision to divert them.

Arriving he said there was a single ambulance on the scene and it was apparent there were three people who needed assistance.

They were a small girl, a woman who “looked distressed” and an adult male who was surrounded by a “cordon of women holding hands like a chain”.

The women “screamed at us to get back”, he said, until they realised they were firefighters.

His crew of three and their driver attended to the injured.

The girl was lying on her back as CPR was being administered to her, Mulvaney said, adding her pink shoes “stood out” and “I still remember them to this day”.

The woman was sitting on steps and had “a lot of blood on her back”, he said. He saw a “large laceration on her back” and “an internal organ was protruding through”.

He said he was also told about two other injured children who had been brought inside a “school or creche” and he went in to check on them.

Returning to the woman, he found her “in a lot of distress” and tried to dress her wound so she could get on a stretcher and be brought to hospital.

Describing the man’s condition, he said he initially thought he was unconscious, but he was breathing and was responding to the stimulus of pain.

Mulvaney said he also spoke to other parents near the scene who were in “great distress” and assured them the parents of any children who had been injured were already on scene.

He said he could not let them get any closer as the area was a crime scene.

A firefighter and advanced paramedic, David Hosback, who was attached to Phibsborough Fire Station, said when he arrived another advanced paramedic was working on the girl.

He said he had a “vivid memory of the pair of runners she was wearing” and a schoolbag nearby, adding she was wearing jeans and a hoodie, part of which had been removed to assist with resuscitation.

The other paramedic had already “completed a number of interventions”, he said, including inserting an injection into the bone, administering a number of drugs including adrenaline and dressing a wound on her chest.

Hosback assisted him with an “advanced airway”.

He also said the girl was given blood from the nearby Rotunda hospital in the ambulance.

Garda Aaron Gratton, who was based in Store Street station in November 2023, also told the jury what he witnessed that day.

Arriving in an unmarked Garda car he said he saw a small child being attended to and Leanne Flynn who had “a large wound to her right torso” and was “screaming in pain”.

He travelled with her by ambulance to the Mater Hospital and there he was made aware Bouchaker was also in the hospital.

Gratton seized clothes that were removed from Bouchaker, along with his runners and underwear and placed them into evidence bags.

At 14.12 he met with Adam Kealy, a former member of An Garda Síochána who now lives in Australia, he gave evidence to the jury on Wednesday.

Kealy handed him other items he had collected, including a hat and a wallet containing a public services card, which were also placed in evidence bags.

The evidence bags were brought to Mountjoy Garda station, Gratton said, and he handed them to the exhibits officer and left.

The hat and the wallet were shown to the court.

During cross-examination Gratton was asked about Bouchaker’s medical care. He said he had “limited interaction” with him but that he “seemed to be unconscious”.

The trial continues on Friday.