Childcare assistant Leanne Flynn grabbed man from behind and later realised she had been stabbed
Childcare assistant Leanne Flynn grabbed man from behind and later realised she had been stabbed Riad Bouchaker, at a trial in the Central Criminal Court, has denied eight offences connected to an incident at Dublin's Parnell Square in November 2023.
Photograph: Gareth Chaney/Collins Photosjury she saw a man “ferociously jabbing” at a child with a knife after he hurriedly approached a group of children on Parnell Square. The five-year-old girl had so much blood on her face and neck that she could not immediately say where the child was stabbed, Leanne Flynn said.
This happened when the children were on the street waiting to be taken by Flynn and another childcare assistant from their school to a nearby creche on November 23rd, 2023. Flynn said she grabbed the man from behind and later realised he had stabbed her. She shouted for help and other adults intervened.
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She was giving evidence in the continuing trial of Riad Bouchaker , a native of Algeria of no fixed abode, who has denied attempting to murder three children, two girls and a boy, on Parnell Square East on November 23rd, 2023. He has also denied assault causing harm to two other children and to a passerby who intervened to assist; as well as a charge of assault causing serious harm to a care worker.
He denied a further charge of producing an article capable of inflicting serious injury, a 36cm kitchen knife. The jury has been told the prosecution case is that Bouchaker‘s actions at Parnell Square, including “stabbing and jabbing” with a knife, “targeting” young children and the need for members of the public to stop him, showed he intended to kill.
Bouchaker told gardaí during interviews he knew he had done something wrong but was sick and not in his right mind at the time and had no intention to kill anyone, the jury was told. He had said he was angry about being refused a social welfare payment that day and had a knife.
Bouchaker, the jury heard, had a head operation in 2021, suffered a head injury during the incident at Parnell Square in 2023 and now has an acquired brain injury. Prior to the trial, Judge Tony Hunt found Bouchaker fit to plead and the jury have been told special mental health defences are not available to him.
In evidence today, Flynn said she was working as a childcare assistant in the creche at Parnell Square on November 23rd, 2023, and was involved in bringing the children from their school to the creche after the school finished. She was doing up a boy’s jacket when a man in dark clothing grabbed her attention. He seemed to be at a bag, “like looking for something”.
She maybe noticed him because he was not going anywhere, he was “just standing there, looking around”. The man came towards the children, came towards one girl in a crouched motion and as he got closer, he came in very hurriedly, she said. She saw the silver bit of a knife and the man was “ferociously jabbing”, she did not know how many times.
“It was multiple. ”Flynn said the other children were still in close proximity and she let out a shout and asked him what was he doing and she ran and grabbed him at his jacket from behind. He did not say anything back to her, he was trying to still continuously jab but when she grabbed him, she pulled him back away from the children. He turned around and she saw him clearly as he did so.
He was fat, had sallow skin, very big eyes, darkish hair. He looked somewhat confused as if he was not expecting an adult or someone bigger to approach him. He stabbed her in the back. At the time, she did not know she was stabbed, she felt something wet.
The man went to try and go back to the children again, she said. He “got close” but someone came over and grabbed the knife. Some of the children had moved, some were frozen and had panicked and could not move. She screamed, “Somebody help me, he has a knife” and that was when other adults intervened.
She grabbed the children and told them to run. Some moved up the road a bit and she took the rest by the arms and pulled them. She had to sit on the steps of a nearby hotel because she was light-headed. The children were close by and she asked a woman to take them into the hotel.
She rang the creche manager and told her they had been attacked by a man with a knife and to come over. She also phoned her partner and told him they were attacked and to come.
“I had to hang up because I could not talk properly. ” Emergency services had arrived at that stage, she said. She was treated on the hotel steps for about five minutes before she was taken to hospital. In cross-examination, counsel for Bouchaker said he was not suggesting anyone other than Riad Bouchaker had caused the injuries to her and the children.
Counsel said she had, “with extraordinary courage” grabbed the man from behind and had suffered injuries. She agreed she had “a pretty clear line of sight” for the first stage of the incident, when Bouchaker approached the children, but had not seen everything after. She agreed she described the man as “ferociously jabbing” with the knife. She disagreed she chose that word because he was wielding the knife from below rather than above.
She agreed Bouchaker had wide eyes, appeared frantic, looked confused and seemed to have been taken by surprise that an adult had grabbed him. She agreed that was an irrational response. She agreed the man was swinging with the knife. She said her impression was that was to cause harm to the children.
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