An All-Ireland winning Tipperary goalkeeper, who won six Munster Championship medals, an All-Star award and a National Hurling League medal, has been given a three-and-a-half year suspended prison sentence, having admitted the offence of obtaining €10,000, by deception, from an elderly man, over four years ago, in 2013.
Mr Darren Gleeson, who is scheduled to line out for the defending champions Tipperary in their qualifying match against Westmeath this weekend; this morning, pleaded guilty at Nenagh Circuit Court to a breach of Section 6 of the Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud Offences) Act 2001.
Mr Gleeson was expected to go on trial before Judge Mr Thomas Teehan and a convened and sworn jury, however his barrister Mr John O’Kelly Senior Counsel indicated, at the outset of the court sitting, that a jury would not be required.
Mr Gleeson aged 36 years, with an address at Shesharoe, Portroe, Nenagh, Co Tipperary, had been charged with two counts of stealing a total of €32,000 from 80 year old Mr Timothy Heenan in 2013, and two alternate counts of obtaining the same monies by deception. Mr Gleeson pleaded guilty this morning, before the jury panel, to one count of obtaining €10,000 by deception.
Mr Justin Dillon Senior Counsel for the State, directed that this plea was indeed acceptable to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), subject to the facts of the other charge, relating to deception, being put before the court. He said that, in due course, the State would enter a “nolle prosequi” (dismissal or termination of legal proceedings), in relation to the theft charges.
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