Salman Aslam Dar arrived in Ireland from Lahore, Pakistan, only months before he began ambushing women walking home alone in Dublin. He pleaded guilty to raping three women. Years later, from prison, he confessed to an attempted rape and sexual assault from the same 2004 period. When the prosecution challenged his sentence, an undertaking that he would return to Pakistan was expressly cited as the reason the appeal court did not go higher.
Five attacks in a matter of months
Dar was a computer-science graduate or software engineer originally from Lahore. The Irish Examiner reported that he had arrived in Ireland only months before the attacks. Between February and June 2004, he separately followed and attacked three women in their 20s as they walked home alone in Dublin. The women were Mexican, Polish and Irish. Two were followed into their apartment buildings.
The court heard that Dar beat all three women and forced them to perform oral sex. The reported locations were near the Phoenix Park, in the Brunswick Street North or Smithfield area, and at Jervis Street. He was arrested two days after the third attack. DNA evidence and the examination of hundreds of hours of CCTV footage identified him.
Those three rape cases were not his complete record. In late 2012, after several years of treatment at Arbour Hill Prison, Dar contacted gardaí and admitted two more attacks committed during the same six-month period in 2004: an attempted rape in Ranelagh and a sexual assault near South Circular Road. Describing his conduct, he told investigators: “I had no plan. If opportunity presents, I’ll attack.” The sentencing judge said those unsolved cases would probably not have resurfaced without his admissions.
The first 15-year term
Dar pleaded guilty to raping the three women. On 20 June 2005, Mr Justice Paul Carney imposed three consecutive seven-year terms and suspended the final two years of each, producing an effective 15-year custodial term. The judge described the kind of offending that created community fear of a serial rapist in its midst.
The Director of Public Prosecutions challenged how that punishment had been structured. In February 2006, the Court of Criminal Appeal held that an effective five years for each offence was individually inadequate. It replaced the consecutive terms with sentences of 10, 12 and 15 years, to run concurrently from 8 June 2004. The total remained 15 years: the appeal changed the structure, not the overall duration.
The undertaking that checked a harsher sentence
The appeal court said it would have been tempted to increase the punishment but for an unqualified undertaking from Dar’s senior counsel that he would return to Pakistan when his imprisonment ended. The court instead left the total term at 15 years while recording the horrific damage caused to the three victims.
That undertaking was not a deportation order. It was a commitment given through defence counsel and relied upon in sentencing. The public record reviewed for this file does not establish Dar’s immigration category, whether a removal order was ever made, whether he left voluntarily, whether the State removed him, or where he is now.
Two unsolved crimes admitted from prison
In July 2014, Dar was sentenced for the attempted rape and sexual assault he had disclosed. Mr Justice Carney imposed seven years with the final two years suspended, leaving a five-year active component. Contemporary reporting said the additional term began immediately, shortly before the original sentence was reportedly due to expire that September.
The court also imposed 18 months of post-release supervision but said it would not be required if Dar left Ireland after completing custody. Defence counsel again said Dar wanted to return to Pakistan at the earliest opportunity. That conditional supervision arrangement still does not establish that departure occurred.
These later convictions did not concern offending committed after release. They were additional attacks from the same 2004 period that remained unsolved until Dar confessed from prison. The legally accurate record is therefore three rapes, one attempted rape and one sexual assault against five women—not five rapes.
Chronology
- Late 2003 or early 2004: Dar arrived in Ireland from Lahore only months before the attacks; no exact date or immigration category was located.
- February–June 2004: three women walking home alone were separately followed, beaten and raped in Dublin.
- Same 2004 period: Dar committed an attempted rape in Ranelagh and a sexual assault near South Circular Road.
- June 2004: arrested two days after the third known rape; DNA and CCTV work linked him to the offences.
- 20 June 2005: after guilty pleas, three consecutive seven-year terms imposed with two years of each suspended, producing 15 years in custody.
- 13 February 2006: DPP appeal changed the sentences to 10, 12 and 15 years concurrent from 8 June 2004; the 15-year total remained.
- Late 2012: Dar contacted gardaí from prison and confessed to the two additional, previously unsolved attacks.
- 14 July 2014: the Central Criminal Court heard sentencing evidence on the further offences.
- 21 July 2014: seven-year sentence imposed with the final two years suspended; 18 months’ post-release supervision ordered unless Dar left Ireland.
- Latest located record: no verified release, departure, deportation, supervision or current-location outcome.
Previous record and adjudicated outcome
No reliable report located for this file states that Dar had a conviction predating the 2004 attacks. That absence is not converted into a claim that no earlier record existed. By the 2014 hearing, the three rape convictions were established prior convictions; the attempted rape and sexual assault were then added to his adjudicated Irish record.
The Court of Criminal Appeal’s 2006 ruling concerned sentence structure after guilty pleas, not an appeal against the safety of the three rape convictions. The later offences were resolved by Dar’s admissions and sentencing. No later appellate ruling changing those outcomes was located.
Cost benchmark: substantial, but not a case invoice
The Irish Prison Service reported an average 2024 cost of €99,072 for an available, staffed prison space, excluding capital expenditure. At that present-day benchmark, the original 15-year term corresponds mechanically to €1,486,080. The later five-year unsuspended component corresponds to a further €495,360 before accounting for overlap.
Adding those illustrations produces €1,981,440, but that is not Dar’s proven cost or exact time served. The 2014 sentence began while the earlier term still had a short reported period to run, so simple addition double-counts some time. Remission, actual release or departure, historic annual prison costs and prison allocation are also unknown.
Sources
- Irish Times original sentencing and nationality report.
- Irish Times Court of Criminal Appeal report.
- Irish Independent appeal and undertaking report.
- Irish Times report on the two prison admissions.
- Irish Examiner final 2014 sentencing report.
- Herald report on the later term and supervision order.
- Irish Prison Service Annual Report 2024.