Dale Creighton’s family ‘sickened’ as last person jailed for killing walks free from prison

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1 dale creighton.jpg
1 dale creighton.jpg

The last person serving jail time for the killing of Dale Creighton has now walked free.

David Burke, 30, who instigated the 2014 gang beating of Dale, 20, on a footbridge overlooking the Tallaght Bypass, was released from Portlaoise Prison yesterday morning, after less than seven years behind bars.

He was the last person in prison for the brutal New Year’s Day killing – after fellow killer Ross Callery, 27, walked free earlier this year.

And speaking last night, Dale’s father Darren said the news of Burke’s release was devastating.

“It’s sickening to say that the seven people involved in Dale’s killing are now free when the rest of Dale’s family have to live with pain and torture.

“Pain that we’re never going to get over. We’re crying every week,” he said.



Picture Shows. Darren Creighton (father of Dale Creighton) who was fatality injuried talks to the Star about one of the gang that was found guilty of the offence has had he sentence reduced on appeal. Date:14.05.2019 Photo:Mick O’Neill.

“I think the justice system in this country is a joke. They’re fairly young, they can go out and live their lives. We’ll never have that opportunity, They took that from us.”

And Darren says it is particularly horrific for him that Burke, who he describes as the ‘ringleader’ in his son’s killing, is now a free man.

“He was the ringleader in all that. They dragged him up and down the steps, and it was described in court as like a ragdoll.

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“He gets to live his life now, while Dale’s was taken from him.”

During his trial, the court heard that David Burke’s sister Aisling had alleged to him that her phone had been stolen – and that Dale Creighton was identified as the alleged culprit.

He was later “marched up the steps onto the footbridge and mercilessly kicked and beaten in a ‘kangaroo court.’

Some of the attack was captured on CCTV and it showed David Burke arriving at the scene with a long pole – where he then confronted Dale with the others.

“David Burke appears to be in control of the situation,” the judge told the court, noting that he struck the victim with two punches to his head and kicked him.

An eighth person, James O’Brien, got out of the car, kicked the deceased twice and punched him nine times to his head.

O’Brien, who was later jailed for a year for that assault, then left.

Ross Callery was next on the scene and immediately struck the deceased with a heavy blow, sending him backwards.

Dale could be seen running away from Callery and Burke, but fell at the bottom of a tree.



David Burke

They caught up with him and followed him up the steps of the bridge again.

They were not seen on camera again for five minutes by which time a witness had called gardai twice to say two men had chased a third into the middle of the bridge.

She said they were kicking and punching him into the head and body, while he lay on the ground.

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She asked for an ambulance when she called the second time.

Gardai in Tallaght Garda Station were able to turn the CCTV camera onto the bridge and capture the remaining four minutes of the attack.

“It’s clear that by that time, Dale Creighton was in a very serious condition. His body is visibly limp,” the judge said, adding that this was particularly noticeable when one person was trying to force him up.

“He resembled a rag doll, who had no independent power of movement.”

While another of the killers, Graham Palmer tried to lift Dale, his-co-attacker Jason Beresford was seen kicking him ‘full in the face as if his head were a football’.

He was also seen stamping on him while prone and grabbing him by the scruff of the neck and flinging him down the steps, she said.

“Ross Callery was unable to resist a kick while Dale Creighton lay prone,” she said.

She said that during the period covered by CCTV, Palmer appeared to be in control of ‘the interrogation’, striking him in head and groin.

“The assault effectively ended when Jason Beresford flung the limp body of Dale Creighton down the steps,” she said.

He had been dragged back up by the time the gardai arrived and all were seen fleeing.

In May 2019 David Burke was granted a reduced sentence on appeal.

He had originally been sentenced to 10 years imprisonment with the final two and a half years suspended, after Ms Justice Deirdre Murphy held David Burke to be the “most culpable of the participants. He was the oldest. He set the agenda. He determined what was to happen.”

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However, the Court of Appeal cut David Burke’s jail term by nine months last year – on grounds that his sentence diverged from the next most culpable participant by too much.

The Court of Appeal was also satisfied that the sentencing judge was correct to draw a distinction between David Burke and Ross Callery because of Burke’s involvement in the early stages of the incident, “as what might be described as an instigator”, and the fact Callery was five years younger.

Dale Creighton’s mother previously told the Central Criminal Court that the “torture and the fear that my son was put through that night will haunt me for the rest of my life”.

It is my first thought in the morning when I wake up and my last at night when I finally fall asleep. I have nightmares about Dale on the bridge that night.

His father said he “couldn’t believe that my son was left unrecognisable in the bed, that one human being could do that to another… Every night for the last three years, I go to sleep thinking of Dale and I wake up to a nightmare.

“So much so, the stress of his death has taken a toll on my health that I have suffered three heart attacks.”