Dublin Court Convicts Man of Attempted Murder of Three Children in 2023 Stabbing

A Dublin court has convicted Riad Bouchaker of the attempted murder of three children in a November 2023 knife attack that injured a care worker and prompted a riot in the city center. The Central Criminal Court found Bouchaker guilty of attempting to murder a five-year-old girl, a five-year-old boy and a six-year-old girl.

The five-year-old girl was stabbed in the heart and now requires a wheelchair, remains non-verbal and cannot swallow safely.

He was also convicted of intentionally or recklessly causing serious harm to care worker Leanne Flynn, who was stabbed while intervening, and of assault causing harm to another boy, another girl and a French teenager. The court further convicted him of producing the 36-centimeter kitchen knife used in the attack.

Bouchaker, an Algerian-born Irish citizen who has lived in Ireland for 25 years, had denied all charges.

He was provided with an Arabic interpreter and a speech-and-language expert throughout the proceedings. Mr Justice Tony Hunt ruled in March 2026 that Bouchaker was fit to stand trial despite a mild cognitive impairment that resulted from a 2021 craniotomy, which left a portion of his brain exposed.

The judge stated that Bouchaker “undoubtedly had cognitive limitations” but that the impairment did not render him unfit.

Bouchaker suffered an additional head injury during the incident and received hospital treatment for one month. Irish police presented 49 CCTV exhibits of Bouchaker’s movements on the day of the attack, edited into a one-hour compilation shown to the jury. Hours before the stabbings, Bouchaker ripped up a social-welfare refusal letter.

Crowds gathered at the crime scene on the evening of November 23, 2023, and a protest formed at the Spire on O’Connell Street. The gathering escalated into disorder that included the burning of a Garda car, buses and a Luas tram, along with shop looting and damage to traffic lights.