‘INCOMPETENT’ | 

‘Ireland’s dumbest criminal’ with over 100 convictions fails to have charge thrown out

His targets have included an elderly neighbour who was living just two doors down from him when she discovered Coade in her house after she came back from a walk while recovering from a stroke, a young woman who he threatened with a scissors and tried to force into a car, and betting shop and bank workers who he terrified during robberies.

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This is the “incompetent” career criminal who has failed in his latest bid to have a conviction for breaking into his elderly neighbour’s house thrown out.

Kevin Coade (44), formerly of Friars Walk in Cork, has around 100 convictions for a litany of offences including false imprisonment, assault causing harm, burglary, robbery, attempted robbery, handling stolen property and various other crimes.

As far back as 1995 when he was jailed for seven months for stealing a motorbike, his own solicitor admitted Coade already had “an appalling record” despite still being a teenager. That appalling record only got worse as his crimes escalated.

His targets have included an elderly neighbour who was living just two doors down from him when she discovered Coade in her house after she came back from a walk while recovering from a stroke, a young woman who he threatened with a scissors and tried to force into a car, and betting shop and bank workers who he terrified during robberies.

Despite the prolific nature of his offending and the misery he has caused to his victims, Coade is no mastermind criminal and one judge went so far as to pointedly describe him as an “incompetent” offender.

He has repeatedly been caught red-handed committing crimes, often while out on bail.

On one occasion he was caught by gardaí after getting stuck in a supermarket when he broke in through a skylight and stole €21,000 worth of cigarettes. Coade had set the alarm off and got stuck in the shop after throwing the cigarettes back up to an accomplice on the roof.

In another incident, after he had stolen €23,000 from a safe in a garage, gardaí showed him CCTV of the incident which proved he committed the crime. Coade then proceeded to steal the USB containing the footage thinking he wouldn’t be prosecuted without the CCTV. He failed to take into account the footage on the USB was only one copy of the original which gardaí had in their possession.

In another bizarre incident, Coade asked his sister to drive him to the bookies to collect winnings before he went in and carried out a robbery with an imitation firearm. He was caught after he stuffed his clothing and the fake firearm in a bag into a garden hedge in full view of the homeowner.

The homeowner, who thought Coade was illegally dumping rubbish and wanted to report him, took down the reg of the car before looking in the bag and seeing the imitation gun. Coade was jailed for three years for that offence.

In yet another incident, Coade was arrested after gardaí spotted him walking down the road pushing a stroller with a six-week-old infant in it while carrying a stolen heavy industrial road cutting machine.

Coade claimed he found it on the road and was planning to return it to a construction site, but a judge agreed with gardaí that he was stealing the expensive machine and sentenced him to four months.

Coade foolishly appealed the conviction handed down, relying on his defence that he was returning the stolen property, but the appeal backfired when the judge described it as “off-the-wall”.

“His own explanation is bizarre… it is complete fiction from start to finish,” the judge said, before increasing his sentence to six months.

In a more sinister incident, Coade held a pair of scissors to the stomach of a young woman and tried to force her into a car.

The 22-year-old woman, who recognised Coade as he was a regular customer at the betting shop where she worked, was terrified for her life when the thug tried to force her into the car in Cork in May 2010.

A passing taxi driver intervened and brought her to a garda station.

Coade blamed his drug use for the incident. “If I was in my right state of mind, I wouldn’t have done it,” he said. “I realise how much I frightened her, I can see all the wrong I’ve done.”

He was jailed for five years for false imprisonment and attempted robbery.