When you're driving a taxi you get all sorts, and I mean ALL sorts. Take today: guy, fading hippy, late 50s early 60s in jeans, down-at-heel- runners, black anorak, long, lank, straggly grey hair and a black hat, for god's sake, I have no idea what kind of a hat, just a generic hat, it could have been anything once, but through countless misdemeanours, errors, satupons, it was a shapeless black mass on his grey hair. He bent to the window as I sat on a rank and asked:
-Could you take me to Castleknock, a place called Castle Court? mmm, I know it to see, but I 'm not sure of the exact location...
Dodgy, methinks, but he's articulate, with an educated North Cork accent, I would guess, and anyway I'm desperate, so I gesture him into the back. Ahhh, ggghhg, I'm REALLY glad he's in the back because he stinks of stale urine. I have the windows open in a trice, and we're rolling.
There's music on from my iPod via Harmon Kardon, and it's good middle-period Baroque, Castello, Froberger, Frescobaldi, Schmelzer, 17th century Music from the Court of Leopold II. We're silent as we listen, and then he says
-It's just 5% too loud here in the back. COuld you? ahhh...Thanks very much. What is it? the Third Programme?
The Third Programme????? I haven't heard BBC radio 3 called the "third programme" in about a million years. I tell him it's my iPod, but I don't think he knows what an iPod is, but it doesn't matter, 'cos he's off:
-The most interesting debate ever on the Third Programme was in 1948 between Bertrand Russell and Father Coppleston. Extraordinary! In the 1940s you could have a debate like that but nowadays, not a chance. Young people aren't EDUCATED today like they used to be.
[you can read the text of this debate here: http://www.ditext.com/russell/debate.html]
He went on:
-How AMAZING it is that such arguments in theology and philosophy could be presented in such an ENERGISING way, I found the whole thing quite STIMULATING, but of course this is out of the question now, I wonder what teachers are actually being taught to teach, certainly not anything which relates to any of the questions, the FUNDAMENTAL questions, of existence. AND the way Coppleston presented his arguments was WONDERFUL! Certainly I think he got the better of Russell, in my opinion anyway.
I'm taking all this in, and not being a philosophy major, I'm just following, but not contributing. He went on:
-I have a Catholic heart but a Protestant mind. I mean most people wouldn't be able to name the two most important Catholic intellectuals Ireland has produced. Most could name the Protestants. I'm sure you're aware of the fact that of the sixteen most important intellectual Ireland has produced, fourteen were Protestant, only two were Catholic. Joyce was one, who was the other? I mean, do you know who was the other?
I think for a moment: can't be Berkeley. He was a Prod, and a bloody minister to boot. Nor Burke, although his father had been a Catholic and had converted. Suddenly I know:
-Was it J D Bernal?
_-Bernal! I never thought of him! Was he Catholic?
I say:-He had Jewish blood on his father's side, but his parents were Catholics.
-Funny. Never heard of Bernal until yesterday...Well, I wasn't thinking of Bernal. Not Joyce, who? can you tell me? A Philospher, to give you a hint.
Immediately a name jumps to my mind: - Are we talking about Scotus?
-SCOTUS, yes, well there you are now. Very few people would know that. And if I were to ask you about the Irish writer who wrote the most filmed book of all time, who would it be?
This one's easy. I think for a moment to make sure, then posit:
-Probably Bram Stoker.
-"Probably"? did you say "probably"? Come on, man, you know damn well, four hundred films!
We have reached Castleknock after the most stimulating and stinkulating journey I've had. He pays me, he leaves (after he tells me that he rang Karl Popper once to ask him something, and the man replied), and I'm exhilarated at the level of the discussion. Couldn't follow half of what he was on about on the Russell/Coppleston debate, but I'm glad I could answer his quiz, and I'm so happy that the smell's gone. Do intellectuals always have to be unwashed? Are there any who understand the principles of personal hygiene?
Thursday 6 September 2007
Sunday 8 July 2007
I'm so tired...
I'm so tired of getting calls to go to places where there is no job because someone was fucking with you, whether in the base control, or in a house adjacent to the one you've called to, and they're laughing at you behind the curtain. I had one of those in my last week driving.
Rathmines, beside the barracks. I'm called to an address, and when I get there, the number I've been given is a wrong one, and the house is empty. I wait, and call, and wait again and ring, and then drive away, exasperated at how someone can find it funny to ring a taxi and send the driver on a wild goose chase.
Once I got sent all the way to Dalkey to an address which didn't exist...
Sometimes i think it's someone in the base who just doesn't like me. But since I don't work for that company anymore, well, they've lost a good driver. I've moved on to better things, and they're still working in base control, playing their silly little tricks on other drivers. Or else, if it's not someone in base control, they're still doing whatever childish thing they were doing.
I'm so tired of reading the crap on the taxi.ie website. If you haven't been there,
pay a visit.
I've given up driving. I'm only putting my reminiscences on this blog now.
Rathmines, beside the barracks. I'm called to an address, and when I get there, the number I've been given is a wrong one, and the house is empty. I wait, and call, and wait again and ring, and then drive away, exasperated at how someone can find it funny to ring a taxi and send the driver on a wild goose chase.
Once I got sent all the way to Dalkey to an address which didn't exist...
Sometimes i think it's someone in the base who just doesn't like me. But since I don't work for that company anymore, well, they've lost a good driver. I've moved on to better things, and they're still working in base control, playing their silly little tricks on other drivers. Or else, if it's not someone in base control, they're still doing whatever childish thing they were doing.
I'm so tired of reading the crap on the taxi.ie website. If you haven't been there,
pay a visit.
I've given up driving. I'm only putting my reminiscences on this blog now.
A bad hair day.
A girl stops my taxi on the street, hand held aloft the proper way, not out like she is trying to stop a bus. When she sits in the back, she starts to sob quietly. I ask her what's bothering her and she tells me it's her hair. She has just come out of the hairdresser having had her hair done some way that isn't the way that she had wanted it to be done. She is totally devastated. Her hair is horrible, she says. Look at it, and she plucks at it as she examines it in her hand-held mirror. She couldn't go back to work, and has called in after the hair job was finished to say she feels ill and is going home. Home is near Phillpsburgh Avenue.
I look at her in the mirror. Her hair seems fine to me. It is shortish and blonde, and she is attractive, in a flirtatious Charlie-girl-type-of-a-way. When I say her hair is shortish and blonde, you have to remember that I'm a man, and that fact immediately limits my descriptive abilities where matters hirsute are concerned. I don't normally have long conversations about haircuts, but I'm in an empathetical mood and I decide to humour her.
_How did you want it cut? I ask and her answer seems to make some sort of sense, but as it's mostly given using adjacent finger positions and tufts of hair in various geometrical relationships, and I can't really drive and watch her in my rear view mirror, I don't really take it in.
I tell her I think it looks good the way it is, but she circumvents my feelgood tactics with a determination that shows she's going to think the worst no matter what I say. She even flirts briefly with the possibility of taking legal action, but I tell her that unless she has a record of what she asked them to do to her hair, and she can also prove that what she has got isn't it, she'll have a tough time. She falters at this point, and in the end I leave her in her misery, her fragile self-esteem in tatters despite my best intentions.
I look at her in the mirror. Her hair seems fine to me. It is shortish and blonde, and she is attractive, in a flirtatious Charlie-girl-type-of-a-way. When I say her hair is shortish and blonde, you have to remember that I'm a man, and that fact immediately limits my descriptive abilities where matters hirsute are concerned. I don't normally have long conversations about haircuts, but I'm in an empathetical mood and I decide to humour her.
_How did you want it cut? I ask and her answer seems to make some sort of sense, but as it's mostly given using adjacent finger positions and tufts of hair in various geometrical relationships, and I can't really drive and watch her in my rear view mirror, I don't really take it in.
I tell her I think it looks good the way it is, but she circumvents my feelgood tactics with a determination that shows she's going to think the worst no matter what I say. She even flirts briefly with the possibility of taking legal action, but I tell her that unless she has a record of what she asked them to do to her hair, and she can also prove that what she has got isn't it, she'll have a tough time. She falters at this point, and in the end I leave her in her misery, her fragile self-esteem in tatters despite my best intentions.
Saturday 9 June 2007
Cosmic Energy
On Friday 8th June I picked up a pair of Americans, one of whom wanted to book me for an airport run at 6.30 on Saturday morning. Never one to turn down a nice airport run, I agreed. Next morning she's coming out of her hotel laden with suitcases, and gets into the car. She's a slightly spaced-out Californian blonde, middle-aged, very attractive, and very intelligent, and I ask her if she was in Dublin for long.
-I was here for...ah.... quite a while...on a Science Project.
She talks like her mind is elsewhere, which it turns out it probably is.
-Oh yeah, what was the project?
-Well, an Irish guy has invented... something, and if it....works, it'll be pretty big, but it's pretty...far out so there was a whole lot of us from...ah...all over the world....meeting here to evaluate a......test for the invention to see if it 'll work.
At this point my mind is clicking and whirring as I search my archives, and ...yes, bingo
-Let me guess. It was an energy project...
-Yes.
-And it was about free energy...
Yes.
-And if it works it'll mean that we have to rewrite the Laws of Thermodynamics...
-That's right. STEORN. How did you know about that?
She sounds amazed, but it's hard to tell because she says everything like she's amazed. I'd read stuff about Steorn, this Irish company which claims to have found an energy source from Magnetic Field resonance, in which the return is greater than unity, which basically means that it releases more energy than it uses to work, with output between 285% and 400% and it has put patents on the various components of the machine as it can't put patents on the entire machine because you can't put a patent on a device that violates established physical and scientific principles. You can read about it :
here
Now this is pretty wild stuff because the First Law of Thermodynamics says you can't create energy from nothing, you can only transform it from one type of energy into another, and usually, in fact always, with an energy loss, and an increase in entropy, ie disorder.
Now I'm postulating: The second Law of Thermodynamics says that the entropy of a closed system increases with time, ie as time passes energy gradually dissipates evenly across the Universe. If this machine can do what Steorn says, then that would qualify as a decrease in entropy, which defies the second law, but what I really like is that if you reverse timeflow, the second law of Thermodynamics is preserved, so perhaps here's a time machine! Now THAT's cool!
Anyway, I'm thinking all this to myself as I'm driving and we're chatting. She can't and doesn't tell me much because it's all secret stuff at this stage and very sensitive, but she's curious about how I know about Steorn, and I tell her about my interest in science through my background, and how my father was involved in cosmic ray research on the Pique du Midi in the Pyrennees in the 1950's, and how he turned his back on it all to get into applied science and technology, specifically sustainable technology, and it turns out she's into this kind of alternative stuff too, so she's fairly open-minded, and then I tell her that I didn't go into science but into music. So at that point she gives me her card, which is actually a postcard, saying that she does media also. I look at the card, and Richard Feynmann is on the front (Feynmann was a theoretical physicist with an empirical approach, and an absolute genius. Goole him if you don't know). Actually it's an ad for Feynmann lectures on DVD, produced by her company, "sound photosynthesis". It turns out she worked with Feynmann at Caltech...At this stage we're at the 'port, so we part, and I promise to check out her website and I tell her to checkout mine which will be on the email I send her, and says she will, and that's that.
The thing is, I've never met anybody with such positive energy radiating from her. Visit the website
here
-I was here for...ah.... quite a while...on a Science Project.
She talks like her mind is elsewhere, which it turns out it probably is.
-Oh yeah, what was the project?
-Well, an Irish guy has invented... something, and if it....works, it'll be pretty big, but it's pretty...far out so there was a whole lot of us from...ah...all over the world....meeting here to evaluate a......test for the invention to see if it 'll work.
At this point my mind is clicking and whirring as I search my archives, and ...yes, bingo
-Let me guess. It was an energy project...
-Yes.
-And it was about free energy...
Yes.
-And if it works it'll mean that we have to rewrite the Laws of Thermodynamics...
-That's right. STEORN. How did you know about that?
She sounds amazed, but it's hard to tell because she says everything like she's amazed. I'd read stuff about Steorn, this Irish company which claims to have found an energy source from Magnetic Field resonance, in which the return is greater than unity, which basically means that it releases more energy than it uses to work, with output between 285% and 400% and it has put patents on the various components of the machine as it can't put patents on the entire machine because you can't put a patent on a device that violates established physical and scientific principles. You can read about it :
here
Now this is pretty wild stuff because the First Law of Thermodynamics says you can't create energy from nothing, you can only transform it from one type of energy into another, and usually, in fact always, with an energy loss, and an increase in entropy, ie disorder.
Now I'm postulating: The second Law of Thermodynamics says that the entropy of a closed system increases with time, ie as time passes energy gradually dissipates evenly across the Universe. If this machine can do what Steorn says, then that would qualify as a decrease in entropy, which defies the second law, but what I really like is that if you reverse timeflow, the second law of Thermodynamics is preserved, so perhaps here's a time machine! Now THAT's cool!
Anyway, I'm thinking all this to myself as I'm driving and we're chatting. She can't and doesn't tell me much because it's all secret stuff at this stage and very sensitive, but she's curious about how I know about Steorn, and I tell her about my interest in science through my background, and how my father was involved in cosmic ray research on the Pique du Midi in the Pyrennees in the 1950's, and how he turned his back on it all to get into applied science and technology, specifically sustainable technology, and it turns out she's into this kind of alternative stuff too, so she's fairly open-minded, and then I tell her that I didn't go into science but into music. So at that point she gives me her card, which is actually a postcard, saying that she does media also. I look at the card, and Richard Feynmann is on the front (Feynmann was a theoretical physicist with an empirical approach, and an absolute genius. Goole him if you don't know). Actually it's an ad for Feynmann lectures on DVD, produced by her company, "sound photosynthesis". It turns out she worked with Feynmann at Caltech...At this stage we're at the 'port, so we part, and I promise to check out her website and I tell her to checkout mine which will be on the email I send her, and says she will, and that's that.
The thing is, I've never met anybody with such positive energy radiating from her. Visit the website
here
Saturday 2 June 2007
Curious...
Coming back from the airport on the old Swords road as I don't use the Kesh. Hoping I'll pick up a fare on the way back to the city. Just through the lights at the boundary of the airport property and there's an airport police car, lights flashing, pulled over. Doors open, two officers drag a pretty but very angry blonde in pink tracksuit out of the car, manhandle her over to the kerb, open the boot, and throw her bags onto the pavement. I drive by, observing all. In my rearview mirror I see them leave, lights still flashing, and I see her putting out her hand trying to get a passing taxi. It's already booked.
Fair enough. I turn around, drive past her, do a u-turn, and pull in, getting out to open the boot for her bags. She's furious.
I put the bags in, and they're heavy. One of them even has a "heavy" tag. She's in the back seat, I'm in the front, -Ballymun, she says. -Sure. Are you alright? I ask. She looks at me. -It's not funny, she says. -I never said it was funny, I say; -I saw what happened and I'm just asking if you're alright.
-I asked you to take me to Ballymun. I didn't ask you to talk to me. I don't want to talk to you. Just take me to Ballymun.
-Fine, whereabouts in Ballymun?
-I'll show you.
-Can you give me the address?
-I said, I'll show you. Weren't you listening to me?
-
So as we get to the lights on the junction with the Old Airport Road and I swing right, she says -Why aren't you going through Santry?
-Because you didn't tell me you wanted me to go through Santry. It's all the same to me. It doesn't make any difference. It's more or less the same distance.
-It makes a difference to me, she says.
-Fine. Would you like me to go back and go through Santry?
-No. I told you I don't want to talk to you.
I've had enough, at this stage.
-Listen, I say, You told me to keep quiet, I kept quiet. Then you asked me why I wasn't going through Santry, and I answered you, and now you're telling me to keep quiet again. You are the rudest person I've ever had in this car. I didn't have to turn around and pick you up, but I saw you were in difficulty and I wanted to help, and right now I'm sorry that I picked you up. I wish I hadn't. I'll drive you to Ballymun.
There's silence. In the mirror I see her stonyfaced staring out the passenger door window. We come into Ballymun and I start to slow, waiting for her to tell me where she wants me to take her. We roll on, no information is forthcoming.
-Where would you like me to go?
-I said, I'll show you. Didn't you hear me? Next right.
She's left it till the last minute to tell me, and I've to get across two lanes of traffic. I say nothing. We swing the right and then she says -left here, but it's too late, and I have to stop and reverse in order to take the left. I still say nothing.
-Stop here, she says, and I do. I tell her the fare and ask, as I always do, -Do you want the receipt?
She looks at me icily. -Is this a joke?
-No, it's not a joke. My meter prints receipts. I'm asking you if you want the recipt. Do you want the recipt?
- No. She gives me the fare.
We get out of the car, I open the boot and put her bags on the ground, turn, get back into the car, wheel it around, and as I drive out of the cul de sac I see her struggling with her keys at the door.
Fair enough. I turn around, drive past her, do a u-turn, and pull in, getting out to open the boot for her bags. She's furious.
I put the bags in, and they're heavy. One of them even has a "heavy" tag. She's in the back seat, I'm in the front, -Ballymun, she says. -Sure. Are you alright? I ask. She looks at me. -It's not funny, she says. -I never said it was funny, I say; -I saw what happened and I'm just asking if you're alright.
-I asked you to take me to Ballymun. I didn't ask you to talk to me. I don't want to talk to you. Just take me to Ballymun.
-Fine, whereabouts in Ballymun?
-I'll show you.
-Can you give me the address?
-I said, I'll show you. Weren't you listening to me?
-
So as we get to the lights on the junction with the Old Airport Road and I swing right, she says -Why aren't you going through Santry?
-Because you didn't tell me you wanted me to go through Santry. It's all the same to me. It doesn't make any difference. It's more or less the same distance.
-It makes a difference to me, she says.
-Fine. Would you like me to go back and go through Santry?
-No. I told you I don't want to talk to you.
I've had enough, at this stage.
-Listen, I say, You told me to keep quiet, I kept quiet. Then you asked me why I wasn't going through Santry, and I answered you, and now you're telling me to keep quiet again. You are the rudest person I've ever had in this car. I didn't have to turn around and pick you up, but I saw you were in difficulty and I wanted to help, and right now I'm sorry that I picked you up. I wish I hadn't. I'll drive you to Ballymun.
There's silence. In the mirror I see her stonyfaced staring out the passenger door window. We come into Ballymun and I start to slow, waiting for her to tell me where she wants me to take her. We roll on, no information is forthcoming.
-Where would you like me to go?
-I said, I'll show you. Didn't you hear me? Next right.
She's left it till the last minute to tell me, and I've to get across two lanes of traffic. I say nothing. We swing the right and then she says -left here, but it's too late, and I have to stop and reverse in order to take the left. I still say nothing.
-Stop here, she says, and I do. I tell her the fare and ask, as I always do, -Do you want the receipt?
She looks at me icily. -Is this a joke?
-No, it's not a joke. My meter prints receipts. I'm asking you if you want the recipt. Do you want the recipt?
- No. She gives me the fare.
We get out of the car, I open the boot and put her bags on the ground, turn, get back into the car, wheel it around, and as I drive out of the cul de sac I see her struggling with her keys at the door.
Thursday 14 December 2006
more penalty points
I got myself another penalty point and a fine yesterday for being in the wrong lane at the White's Cross junction. The irritating thing is that I had been in the correct lane, but thought I was in the wrong one, so I "corrected" and then found that my correction actually put me into the right-turning lane when I was going straight on. After indicating and getting back into the lane I had been in, a garda pulled me over and accused me of skipping uo a few cars just to get through the lights quicker than anyone else. Bastard wouldn't believe my genuine error.
Saturday 9 December 2006
Getaway
When you get into a taxi, you never know whose been sitting in the seat before you. Likewise, when I pick up a fare, I never know who I'm putting into the seat beside or behind me. It's scary sometimes, and it can lead to strange situations.
October 2004; I'm sitting on the rank in Stillorgan at about 3.45pm when this guy gets into the taxi breathing heavily. He is tall, skinny, with wispy red-hair and a smigeen of a beard. He is panting, a bit short of breath.
-Deansgrange Office Park, he says, and I start up the car and swing her around to head back to the lights at the crossroads.
He takes a deep breath, holds it for a moment, then exhales, blowing out the air forcefully, as though relieved about something.The lights are red, and I indicate left, before stopping on the white line. There is silence for a few seconds, before he says:
-These lights are very long, aren't they?.
-Ah, they'll change in a minute.
(beat)
-Ah come on, change, I'm in a hurry.
Eventually we get a green and we swing down the hill to the N11 where I indicate right, but these lights are red also.
-Ah no, anudder one! these bleedin' lights, thee take agis...
-No they're changing now, I reply, indicating the amber on the main road.
We get the green and continue on, up the N11, down Kill lane, across the crossroads at Dean's Grange, then into the office park on the right.
-Just drop us anywhere here, he says. -How much is that?
I tell him, he hands me a tenner and says -That's alright.
Then he's out of the car, closes the door, and I carry on with my day, thinking nothing of the incident. Just another tenner, just another fare.
But later when I get back to my apartment with my wife, having picked her up on my way home as I usually do, there's a little note in my letter box which I read as we walk up the stairs: -Dear Mr [name withheld], please contact the Gardai at Blackrock station.
I express my surprise aloud to my wife, upon which I hear my name being called from the top of the stairs.
-Yes? I answer.
A very pretty blond appears around the corner of the stairwell.
-Gardai. Do you have a moment? Nothing to worry about.
She is accompanied by an older man. Both are in plain clothes. The man says:
-Don't worry, we know from the carriage office that you're one of the good guys. Anyone who's listed there as having returned property is usually on the right side of the law.
He grins at me and I feel relieved. I lead the way to my apartment and let them in.
-Did you pick up anyone in Stillorgan today?
I think for a moment, then recall that I did a few jobs from that rank.
-Can you remember any of them?
I tell them I have to consult my logbook, which I take from my bag, find the page, then list the jobs I did from there.
-It's this one we're interested in, she says, pointing to the incident I described above. -We think he tried to rob a bank in Stillorgan. He held a knife to a woman's throat in the bank, but she fought back, and got her hand cut quite badly. He ran out and was seen by a witness to get into your car. The witness gave us the roof-sign number.
The questioning continued, and I recall as much as I can. I agree to try to identify him at the station next day, and they take their leave.
Next day at the station, I'm faced with a whole lot of pictures. I pick out one, then another. Two almost identical faces of two different people. One lives locally, the other farther away in another suburb. Both are possible suspects. They get the local one in and I have to sit behind a hatch, pretending I'm working there so that I can get a good look at him while they ask this guy some questions. It could be him, and I'm pretty sure it is him, but it turns out that he has a cast-iron alibi: his baby daughter has just died shortly after being born and he was at his partner's side in the hospital at the time of the crime. I feel guilty about having misidentified him, but everyone agrees that he's a dead ringer for the suspect.
They can't find the other guy right now, so they tell me not to worry about it, and they'll get in touch if they need to.
About a year and a half later I receive a summons to appear in court in November 2006 as a witness, although why I'm not sure as I misidentified another guy as the one who got into my car. When the date eventually arrives, I go to court and the suspect is there as well, but he's put on lots of weight, changing his appearance completely. I wouldn't have recognised him if he hadn't stood when the case was called. There's an array of charges against him, to all of which he pleads guilty, and because one of them is a lot worse than the incident in which I was involved, the prosecution agrees to drop the other charges and to only prosecute the more serious one.
Here's a link to the news report of the final case when it came before the court:
http://www.ntlworld.ie/News/Irish/?chid=0117bf71d2abaee3beadeb3074e42016
and this is from the Irish Times website; the reference to the Stillorgan event occurs near the end of the report:
Detective confronted post office robber
A court heard how a Garda detective confronted a drug addict with a chair when he robbed a post office. The defendant was then held with the aid of two members of the public, Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard.
Jason Campbell (26) of Donomore Crescent, Tallaght, Co Dublin, will be sentenced by Judge Michael White in February for this offence and other armed robberies committed in October and November 2004.
Det Garda James Donegan, now retired, was subsequently awarded the Scott Medal for his bravery in trying to thwart the knife-wielding Campbell at Glenview Post Office in Tallaght.
Campbell had held a knife to a customer's neck and demanded money be placed in the Dunnes Stores bag he had brought with him. The cashier gave him €5,030 before he tried to get away.
Det Garda Donegan, who was off-duty heard the commotion while in a pharmacy, took a chair with him and rushed to the post office shouting "gardaí".
Campbell rushed at him holding the knife and managed to push the chair away. He stabbed Det Garda Donegan in the side and pushed past him on to the street outside but was chased by him and another off-duty garda who had been in the post office at the time of the robbery. With the aid of two passers-by they managed to catch Campbell and hold him on the ground while he struggled violently until Garda reinforcements arrived.
Campbell pleaded guilty to six armed robberies of banks, post offices and a credit union.
He grabbed pensioner Marion O'Hanlon by the neck and held a knife to her throat when he raided the Permanent TSB in Stillorgan in November 2004, but as he was demanding money from the cashier Ms O'Hanlon broke free, cutting her hand on the knife, severing several tendons.
She ran to the door just as Campbell was making his escape through it with over €8,000 and fell, breaking her wrist. Judge White heard that she has never regained full use of her hand.
Campbell used a replica Colt revolver when with two other men he escaped with €5,500 from the AIB bank in Celbridge, Co Kildare, in November 2004. All three had scarves covering their faces and the others were armed with a hammer and a screwdriver.
The court heard that Campbell had a significant drug problem but had taken steps while in custody to deal with the addiction, although he had broken the terms of bail granted to him in February to allow him to attend a residential drug treatment programme.
October 2004; I'm sitting on the rank in Stillorgan at about 3.45pm when this guy gets into the taxi breathing heavily. He is tall, skinny, with wispy red-hair and a smigeen of a beard. He is panting, a bit short of breath.
-Deansgrange Office Park, he says, and I start up the car and swing her around to head back to the lights at the crossroads.
He takes a deep breath, holds it for a moment, then exhales, blowing out the air forcefully, as though relieved about something.The lights are red, and I indicate left, before stopping on the white line. There is silence for a few seconds, before he says:
-These lights are very long, aren't they?.
-Ah, they'll change in a minute.
(beat)
-Ah come on, change, I'm in a hurry.
Eventually we get a green and we swing down the hill to the N11 where I indicate right, but these lights are red also.
-Ah no, anudder one! these bleedin' lights, thee take agis...
-No they're changing now, I reply, indicating the amber on the main road.
We get the green and continue on, up the N11, down Kill lane, across the crossroads at Dean's Grange, then into the office park on the right.
-Just drop us anywhere here, he says. -How much is that?
I tell him, he hands me a tenner and says -That's alright.
Then he's out of the car, closes the door, and I carry on with my day, thinking nothing of the incident. Just another tenner, just another fare.
But later when I get back to my apartment with my wife, having picked her up on my way home as I usually do, there's a little note in my letter box which I read as we walk up the stairs: -Dear Mr [name withheld], please contact the Gardai at Blackrock station.
I express my surprise aloud to my wife, upon which I hear my name being called from the top of the stairs.
-Yes? I answer.
A very pretty blond appears around the corner of the stairwell.
-Gardai. Do you have a moment? Nothing to worry about.
She is accompanied by an older man. Both are in plain clothes. The man says:
-Don't worry, we know from the carriage office that you're one of the good guys. Anyone who's listed there as having returned property is usually on the right side of the law.
He grins at me and I feel relieved. I lead the way to my apartment and let them in.
-Did you pick up anyone in Stillorgan today?
I think for a moment, then recall that I did a few jobs from that rank.
-Can you remember any of them?
I tell them I have to consult my logbook, which I take from my bag, find the page, then list the jobs I did from there.
-It's this one we're interested in, she says, pointing to the incident I described above. -We think he tried to rob a bank in Stillorgan. He held a knife to a woman's throat in the bank, but she fought back, and got her hand cut quite badly. He ran out and was seen by a witness to get into your car. The witness gave us the roof-sign number.
The questioning continued, and I recall as much as I can. I agree to try to identify him at the station next day, and they take their leave.
Next day at the station, I'm faced with a whole lot of pictures. I pick out one, then another. Two almost identical faces of two different people. One lives locally, the other farther away in another suburb. Both are possible suspects. They get the local one in and I have to sit behind a hatch, pretending I'm working there so that I can get a good look at him while they ask this guy some questions. It could be him, and I'm pretty sure it is him, but it turns out that he has a cast-iron alibi: his baby daughter has just died shortly after being born and he was at his partner's side in the hospital at the time of the crime. I feel guilty about having misidentified him, but everyone agrees that he's a dead ringer for the suspect.
They can't find the other guy right now, so they tell me not to worry about it, and they'll get in touch if they need to.
About a year and a half later I receive a summons to appear in court in November 2006 as a witness, although why I'm not sure as I misidentified another guy as the one who got into my car. When the date eventually arrives, I go to court and the suspect is there as well, but he's put on lots of weight, changing his appearance completely. I wouldn't have recognised him if he hadn't stood when the case was called. There's an array of charges against him, to all of which he pleads guilty, and because one of them is a lot worse than the incident in which I was involved, the prosecution agrees to drop the other charges and to only prosecute the more serious one.
Here's a link to the news report of the final case when it came before the court:
http://www.ntlworld.ie/News/Irish/?chid=0117bf71d2abaee3beadeb3074e42016
and this is from the Irish Times website; the reference to the Stillorgan event occurs near the end of the report:
Detective confronted post office robber
A court heard how a Garda detective confronted a drug addict with a chair when he robbed a post office. The defendant was then held with the aid of two members of the public, Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard.
Jason Campbell (26) of Donomore Crescent, Tallaght, Co Dublin, will be sentenced by Judge Michael White in February for this offence and other armed robberies committed in October and November 2004.
Det Garda James Donegan, now retired, was subsequently awarded the Scott Medal for his bravery in trying to thwart the knife-wielding Campbell at Glenview Post Office in Tallaght.
Campbell had held a knife to a customer's neck and demanded money be placed in the Dunnes Stores bag he had brought with him. The cashier gave him €5,030 before he tried to get away.
Det Garda Donegan, who was off-duty heard the commotion while in a pharmacy, took a chair with him and rushed to the post office shouting "gardaí".
Campbell rushed at him holding the knife and managed to push the chair away. He stabbed Det Garda Donegan in the side and pushed past him on to the street outside but was chased by him and another off-duty garda who had been in the post office at the time of the robbery. With the aid of two passers-by they managed to catch Campbell and hold him on the ground while he struggled violently until Garda reinforcements arrived.
Campbell pleaded guilty to six armed robberies of banks, post offices and a credit union.
He grabbed pensioner Marion O'Hanlon by the neck and held a knife to her throat when he raided the Permanent TSB in Stillorgan in November 2004, but as he was demanding money from the cashier Ms O'Hanlon broke free, cutting her hand on the knife, severing several tendons.
She ran to the door just as Campbell was making his escape through it with over €8,000 and fell, breaking her wrist. Judge White heard that she has never regained full use of her hand.
Campbell used a replica Colt revolver when with two other men he escaped with €5,500 from the AIB bank in Celbridge, Co Kildare, in November 2004. All three had scarves covering their faces and the others were armed with a hammer and a screwdriver.
The court heard that Campbell had a significant drug problem but had taken steps while in custody to deal with the addiction, although he had broken the terms of bail granted to him in February to allow him to attend a residential drug treatment programme.
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