Inmate who suffered brutal beating in Mounjoy Prison was jailed over violent revenge attack

Patrick Smith (27) of Hawthorne Avenue, East Wall was the victim of a sustained attack carried out in his cell last weekend.

After a horrifically injured Smith was discovered in his cell, he was rushed to the Mater hospital where he underwent surgery for his injuries.

Smith, who is currently behind bars for theft related offences, was jailed for two and a half years in 2015 over his role in a savage pre-planned attack on another man outside the Central Bank in retaliation for an earlier prison assault.

Smith and three other men dragged Ian McKenna to the ground and kicked and punched him before one of the group stabbed him eight times leaving him with life threatening injuries.

Ambulance crews who arrived at the scene discovered that McKenna had a machete with him.

He later claimed he had this for his own protection as he had been expecting the attack.

Two years after that attack, Smith pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to violent disorder at the Central Bank Plaza on September 9, 2013.

He also pleaded guilty to robbery in Ladbrokes on the North Strand Road, Dublin on January 13, 2012.

He was on bail for this incident when he assaulted McKenna and had 80 previous convictions.

Gardaí identified Smith and the three other men after viewing CCTV footage of the assault.

It was accepted that Smith didn't stab McKenna but kicked him while he was on the ground.

Gda O'Sullivan agreed with Derek Cooney BL, defending, that the man who led the attack later told gardaí that he had been holding his five-month-old baby during a prison visit when McKenna stabbed him.

He accepted that the Central Bank assault was a pre-planned retaliation for the earlier incident in the prison.

Sources confirmed to the Sunday World earlier today that Smith is now in a stable condition in the Mater hospital.

It’s understood he sustained several broken ribs as a result of last weekend’s assault.