A 25-YEAR-OLD career criminal who tortured an 89-year-old widow during a savage attack at her Co Wicklow home has been jailed for eight years.
Eva Sutton suffered seven broken ribs, a punctured lung, and cuts to her body and face in the robbery at her home in Bray on September 10 2015.
Mrs Sutton has since been unable to return to her house of 54 years and is now living in a nursing home.
Michael Cash, from Ashlawn Park in Ballybrack, Dublin, was one of two men who beat and kicked Mrs Sutton during the robbery.
His accomplice, Jamie O'Brien, is already serving a ten-year sentence for the crime.
At Wicklow Circuit Court yesterday, Judge Michael O’Shea described the attack as "vicious, violent, savage, and brutal" and said it had ruined Mrs Sutton's life.
During the burglary, Cash and O'Brien kicked their way into Mrs Sutton's home, attacked her for an hour-and-a-half, dragged her by the hair and tied her up with her dog's lead.
Cash and O’Brien ransacked the house before stealing possessions including jewellery, watches, rings and £100.
They even tried to pull her wedding ring off her finger.
Judge O'Shea said they showed her no sympathy or mercy even when she told them: "I'm dying, I'm dying".
Cash, who has 96 previous convictions, including 29 for thefts and burglaries, was on bail at the time.
He was sentenced to ten years in prison with the final two suspended.
Mrs Sutton told RTÉ how the attack had shattered her life.
"(Before the burglary) I was still able to do everything for myself at home and go out and about, go out to the shops and come in, and go out and meet my friends," she said.
"I miss all that. I miss the people of Bray, I really do miss them.
"I knew a time was coming, I was getting on in years, and a time was coming that I would eventually have to give up, but I wasn't ready for that, anything near that."
She said she has been unable to return to her former home since the burglary.
"I've passed it but I don't look at it," she said. "I've never looked at it. Maybe I'm foolish. I couldn't bring myself to look at it. I had a lot of very happy memories."
