Dundalk court: Jailed for harassment and threatening to kill a woman
A Polish man who sent over 270 text messages to a woman in which he used explicit language towards her and graphic racial terms towards her partner, went on to threaten to kill the victim in Poland where he said there are many skinheads and friends of Adolf Hitler, Dundalk Circuit Court heard last week.
Sebastian Nowicki (44) with an address at Mill Road, Saggart, Co. Dublin has been jailed for three years, having pleaded guilty to harassing the woman on dates between December 10th 2014 and January 30th 2015 and making a threat to kill at Drogheda Garda Station on July ninth 2021.
The investigating Garda told the court the victim, whose family knew the defendant's family in Poland, had moved in with him and his family in Saggart in November 2013, but around New Year’s in 2014, he began to insult her and her partner who is from East Africa.
The couple moved and the woman received phone calls and texts from the defendant.
She reported the harassment to gardai in 2016, hoping he would stop contacting her, but the court heard it continued and 271 text messages were downloaded from two mobile phones seized in a search of his home.
They were sexually derogatory towards the victim and racially so towards her partner while seven postcards and a letter were also sent to the woman’s family home in Poland.
While before the court charged with harassment, a bench warrant was issued for the defendant, who made a threat in the garda’s presence.
He was cautioned that that was an offence and he replied "I will kill her.
Not here...in Poland. There are many skinheads in Poland and many friends of Adolf Hitler in Poland. ‘SiegHeil’".
The Defence barrister said his client had a disproportionate reaction to a grievance he had about being owed money for Christmas presents.
He added he’s been in Ireland for almost 17 years working as a panel beater, but he began drinking heavily when he lost his job during Covid.
Judge Patrick Quinn imposed a four and half year sentence for the harassment with the final 18 months suspended and a consecutive 18 months for the threat to kill offence which he suspended in its entirety.
The judge also directed that Mr. Nowicki does not communicate by any means with the complainant or any member of her family for 10 years.