Witness describes 'chaos' following stabbing of children on Parnell Square

Eoin Reynolds

A receptionist has told the Central Criminal Court that she heard someone screaming 'the kid is dead' as 'chaos' unfolded on the street outside her Dublin city centre workplace, where she saw a girl lying on the ground being treated by paramedics and a man unconscious nearby.

The jury in the trial of Riad Bouchaker (52), who denies attempting to murder three children, were also on Friday shown a bloodstained jacket belonging to a childcare worker whom it is alleged the accused man seriously harmed.

Luciana Yaya told the trial that she thought she recognised the man lying on the ground as the same person who had earlier that afternoon entered the English Language school while she was at the reception desk.

Yaya told prosecution counsel Karl Finnegan that a man entered through the front door at about 12:30pm, and she noticed him because she didn't think he looked like a student.

Usually if people are lost or need something, they would ask, but she said this man just came over to her side and walked towards a hall leading to the back of the school. She asked him if she could help him and he initially ignored her.

When she asked a second time, he said: "No, no worries, I am waiting for someone."

She asked who he was waiting for and he replied: "My friend and the kid."

Yaya said she and her fellow receptionist told him, "that's next door, there are no kids here," and he left.

She continued working but later that afternoon she heard one of her colleagues 'screaming' outside. When she went out the front, she found the street in 'chaos'.

She added: "People were screaming, this man was lying on the floor covered with blood. At the beginning I thought it was a car accident because there was a motorbike there... A woman was screaming, 'the kid is dead'."

She said people were trying to hit the man on the ground, but two or three women were trying to stop them, saying, 'no, we don't do things like this, wait for the police'.

Yaya broke down in tears as she said she didn't understand what was going on until she saw a paramedic attending to a 'little kid' on the ground.

One of the paramedics went to the man on the ground and sat him up. When Yaya saw his face, she said she thought it was the same man who had entered the language school earlier.

She described the man she had seen as being 'a bit chubby', wearing a brown coat and a green, grey or dark-coloured beanie hat. He had a scar on the side of his face, she said.

Under cross-examination by defence counsel, she insisted that she was able to see the scar despite the fact he was wearing a hat. She rejected a suggestion that she had picked up the detail about the scar from later conversations and 'joined the two memories'.

Bouchaker, 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 on Friday, Patricia Byrne told prosecution counsel Carol Doherty that she was walking along Mary St in Dublin when she heard a man being 'quite aggressive in his words'.

When she looked, she heard the man saying, 'sh*t Irish, sh*t f***ing Irish'. As she walked on, she heard him say the same thing to a group of English, Welsh and Scottish tourists.

The tourists were laughing, she said, but she told them it was 'not funny'.

Byrne went into a shop and emerged a short time later to see the same man approach two women with buggies. She walked on a little further and he walked out of her view, she said.

She remembered the man was wearing dark clothes and said she just got a 'quick glance' at him. Ms Byrne identified herself and the man she saw on CCTV footage.

Gda Niall Ormsby told Mr Finnegan that he photographed the scene on the afternoon of the attack.

He showed the jury a booklet of photographs which included packaging for a 24cm carving knife that gardai found inside a rucksack near the scene.

Gda Ormsby said he also took exhibits from the scene, including a bloodstained, beige, sleeveless jacket that had been hanging on a railing outside the St George Hotel.

Gda Ormsby showed the jacket to the jury and said it belonged to a childcare worker whom it is alleged Bouchaker assaulted.

He also showed the jury a dark-coloured hooded jacket worn by a girl who was allegedly assaulted in the incident and a pink and green schoolbag belonging to another alleged victim.

The trial continues before Mr Justice Tony Hunt and a jury of nine men and three women.