A widower who harassed a woman he met on a dating site and sent a letter to the bank where she worked claiming “she wouldn’t give me a loan” has avoided a jail term for this, making threats to kill and smearing his garda cell with blood.
Peter McCormack, 59, of Ballinakill, Moate, Co Westmeath, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to harassing Mary Farrell between March and September 2020, and making threats to kill and criminal damage of a cell in the garda station on September 9, 2020.
At a sentencing hearing last July, Garda Aishling Conroy told Gerardine Small BL, prosecuting, that Ms Farrell met McCormack on the dating site Plenty of Fish and began a romantic relationship lasting a number of months, which she ended in December 2019.
