Jury shown CCTV footage of children attacked on Parnell Square

Eoin Reynolds

A jury has viewed CCTV footage of the moment a man dressed in black launched a knife attack on a group of children as they stood in line on Dublin's Parnell Square on their way to an after-school crèche.

Gda John Heatherton showed the jury a slowed-down and zoomed-in version of the footage, which captured part of the attack that left several children injured and one girl with severe brain damage after suffering major blood loss due to a stab wound to the heart.

Gda Heatherton told Karl Finnegan SC, for the Director of Public Prosecutions, that he compiled CCTV footage from across the city centre to track a man wearing a black cap, glasses, a black jacket, jeans and carrying a rucksack.

At about 1pm, roughly 30 minutes before the attack, Gda Heatherton said the same man appeared to walk behind a group of school children who were going towards O'Connell St.

He turned away from that group and went back up Parnell Square East where, at 1.34 pm, he stood at a bus stop in front of the Delfin English Language School for one minute and 46 seconds.

The man was holding a bag to his front before CCTV footage from the side of a Dublin Bus captured him moving towards the group of children.

The jury then viewed footage from the Charles Stewart Hotel which showed the moment the attack occurred.

Riad Bouchaker (52), of no fixed address, is on trial at the Central Criminal Court charged with the attempted murder of two girls and one boy, and assault causing serious harm to a care worker, at Parnell Square East in Dublin City on November 23rd 2023.

He is further charged with assaulting two other children and an adult male and with producing a knife in a manner likely to intimidate.

He has pleaded not guilty to all charges and his trial before a jury of nine men and three women is expected to last up to five weeks.

Earlier, Gda Heatherton told Finnegan the clips he compiled showed what gardai believe to be the suspect's movements before and during the incident on Parnell Square East.

The first piece of footage, he said, showed the man dressed in black leaving a De Paul hostel on Little Britain St at 11.06am.

A male matching that description walked to the Ilac Shopping Centre, with CCTV footage showing him going to a cafe in Dunnes Stores where he sat with another man.

Gda Heatherton said the men left Dunnes and went to a lift area at 11.31am where they stood for some minutes and appeared to be going through paper documents.

Minutes later, the male with the black cap was recorded inside the Ilac Centre where he appeared to rip up some paper and discard it in the direction of a Christmas tree.

Gda Heatherton said the man returned to the hostel on Little Britain St at 11.50am and appeared to throw a pair of shoes into a bin in the hallway. #]At 12pm he left the hostel in the same outfit with the rucksack and now pulling a suitcase on wheels.

He walked to a premises on Talbot St where he and a number of other men entered at around the same time.

He spoke to two men and appeared to open the luggage bag he had been carrying while talking to one of the men, Gda Heatherton said.

After about ten minutes, the man in the black cap left and walked in the direction of O'Connell St.

He arrived at Cavendish Row, at the top of O'Connell St, at about 12.34pm and spent some time on Rutland Place, a laneway that accesses the back of the Delfin school.

Gda Heatherton said the man went into the rear of the Delfin school premises twice before emerging back onto Parnell Place at 12.57 pm.

At the front of the Delfin School, a group of school children had lined up before walking down Parnell Square and Gda Heatherton said the male appeared to walk behind them holding the rucksack to his front.

However, he again walked down Rutland Place before reemerging onto Parnell Square at 1.32pm.

Gda Heatherton then showed the jury the footage from outside the Delfin School and the Charles Stewart Hotel which captured part of the attack.

Earlier this morning, the mother of one of the children whom it is alleged Bouchaker tried to murder, told the trial that her son was five years old at the time.

She received a call from a teacher in the early afternoon to say there had been an incident and her son was hurt, but he was 'okay'.

Her son was to be taken to Crumlin Hospital where she met him in the back of the ambulance.

Her son was looking at cartoons on a phone that had been given to him by a garda who was travelling in the ambulance.

When doctors examined the boy, they found he had a wound on his neck which required paper stitches and dressing.

The trial continues before Judge Tony Hunt and the jury of nine men and three women.