Dad tells of trauma after youth gets probation for vehicle rap

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.

- BY PAUL HEALY and MICHAEL O'TOOLE

"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.

Judge Valerie Corcoran ordered that he be monitored by the probation services for nine months. The teen cannot be named as he is a minor.