Thieves stole car hours before kid's vital hospital visit

Dad tells of trauma after youth gets probation for vehicle rap

- PAUL HEALY and MICHAEL O'TOOLE

A YOUNG dad says his world was turned upside down after burglars stole his car - hours before he was to bring his cancer-stricken son to a vital medical appointment.

"I do not sleep well now. Any bump or noise in the night wakes me and I feel compelled to check the house and cars," the father said as a teen admitted an offence connected to the theft.

The SUV was stolen early this year as the father prepared to take his six-year-old son to hospital in the latest appointment in his battle against leukaemia - a disease for which he had already undergone two bone marrow transplants.

And the father says the crime had a devastating effect on the family - just when they should have been concentrating on their son's health battle.

The father, whom we are not identifying to protect the privacy of his little boy, was speaking to us hours after he watched a teen criminal admit an offence connected to the theft of his car in February.

The 17-year-old, who already has 20 criminal convictions, appeared at the Children's Court in central Dublin on Monday where he admitted one count of allowing himself to be carried in the stolen SUV.