Woman given suspended sentence for party in Laois

A woman who had a house party during Covid restrictions was given a one month suspended sentence.   

Gardai found 25 people in a house in Portlaoise at the height of the covid restrictions on St Patrick’s Day 2021, a sitting of Portlaoise District Court was told. 

Laura Kerry, 39 of 399 Market Mews, Maryborough, Portlaoise pleaded guilty to organising an event in a property during the covid restrictions on March 17, 2021.

Garda James O’Conner gave evidence of attending at the property at 10.20pm on the night in question. He said he spoke to the defendant and there was five people in the kitchen/dining area and in excess of 20 people in the back garden area. “It was a party,” he told a sitting of Portlaoise District Court. 

“This was the second time in the space of an hour that guards had called to that house,” he added. 

Solicitor Barry Fitzgerald said his client is the mother of five children. He said she would deny being at the property when gardai first called that day. “She is having difficulty with the lack of fatherly influence,” he told the court.  “She accepts that she should have been more compliant,” added Mr Fitzgerald. 

“I don’t regard this as a minor matter,”  said Judge Andrew Cody. 

While she was having a “hoolie” he said, “people were watching their mothers and fathers die in a home.”

“I am going to convict and sentence her to the maximum one month, suspended for two years,” Judge Cody said.