Thug who attacked influencer Charleen Murphy says ‘she has nothing to fear from me’

We tracked down 28-year-old Craig O’Brien this week after Ms Murphy — who sustained a two-inch laceration to her face in the assault — spoke of her horror on learning he had been freed from prison.

We confronted O’Brien outside an address in Ballyfermot, Dublin, where we put it to him that Charleen was still restricting her online posts out of fear she could again be stalked on social media.

“Tell her I don’t want anything to do with her,” O’Brien told our reporter.

“I never want to see her again. Tell her I won’t be going near her.

“She has nothing to fear from me. I won’t be going anywhere near her.”

Asked if he was sorry for what he did to Charleen, O’Brien responded: “Yeah.”

Charleen (25) is a social media influencer and presenter with over 260,000 followers on Instagram. She is best known for co-hosting the popular Hold My Drink podcast with her close pal Ellie Kelly.

O’Brien was freed from prison in March this year after serving over 13 months of an 18-month sentence for the shocking attack on Ms Murphy at the Grafton Capital Hotel on February 10 last year.

The Sunday World has established that O’Brien served out the full term of his sentence once standard remission of 25 per cent had been applied.

O’Brien had been in custody since his arrest the day after he carried out the attack on Charleen.

In November last year, Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that O’Brien was pleading guilty to assault causing harm to Charleen.

He has ten previous convictions, including two for assault.

Passing sentence, Judge Orla Crowe said the CCTV shown to the court was “absolutely shocking footage that came out of nowhere”.

She said “Ms Murphy had no way of protecting herself as she was hit from behind”.

Judge Crowe said there was no history or animosity between Ms Murphy and O’Brien and described the attack as “unprovoked, unwarranted and terrible”.

The judge said while O’Brien was being interviewed by gardaí, he referred to Charleen in “utter derogatory terms”, a female who had done nothing to him.

The court heard that Charleen is a social media influencer with many online followers.

On the night in question, she went to the Grafton Capital Hotel to meet a friend for dinner and drinks.

On her arrival, she posted photos on social media, which was normal for her.

Charleen was sitting in a booth in the restaurant facing her friend when she felt a blow to the back of her head.

Ms Murphy’s head was propelled forward, resulting in her forehead striking a glass on the table.

The victim turned around and saw O’Brien, whom she knew of but had never met in person, walking away from her table.

Charleen was bleeding and her friend called an ambulance, and the gardai were notified.

Later on the night of the offence, O’Brien sent Charleen a voice note on social media asking her, “how’s the head?”.

Garda Stephen McDonnell told Lisa Dempsey BL, prosecuting, that gardaí spoke with Charleen at the scene and she was in a position to identify O’Brien.

She was then taken by ambulance to St James’s Hospital where she received stitches to her forehead.

CCTV footage from the hotel was obtained by gardaí and played to the court.

Garda McDonnell said O’Brien was contacted and attended Pearse Street Garda Station the following day. A search warrant was issued for O’Brien’s home. Clothing was seized, including a Canada Goose jacket, which was visible on CCTV footage.

The court heard that during his garda interview, O’Brien said that “influencers were ganging up on him and harassing him, and they [influencers] deserved it”.

He also referred to Charleen as a “dumb b***h” and said “he felt bad for her, but she probably deserved it.”

Gardaí asked O’Brien if he had any mental health issues, and he replied that he took medication every day for psychosis.

He was brought to Dublin District Court, where he was denied bail.

He had been in custody since February 11, 2023.

Charleen read her own victim impact statement to the court and said, “I share a lot of my life online and live a very public life.”

She said: “This was never an issue until February of this year.”

She told the court that she had “a physical scar on her forehead, but that emotional scars don’t fade”.

Since the assault, she has suffered from nightmares, panic attacks and is “a shell of myself”. Charleen said “not a day goes by that I don’t think of it” and hoped that “today justice can be served”.

Miska Hanahoe BL, said that her client wished to apologise and said that he is not a danger to Charleen and won’t contact her upon his release.

She said it was clear that her client had a problem with aggression, which was linked to drugs that he began taking when he was 14.

She said that at the time of the offence, her client was in a drug-induced psychosis and genuinely believed that social media influencers were out to get him.

She said her client is engaging with a drug counsellor while he has been in custody.

O’Brien stated in a letter to the court that “I am really sorry” and “I regret what I did”. His letter also stated that he was not taking his medication at the time of the offence.

Ms Hanahoe asked the court to take into account her client’s early guilty plea, his remorse and that he doesn’t recognise the person that he was at the time of the offence.

Speaking on the latest episode of Doireann Garrihy’s podcast Doireann and Friends last week, Charleen said she found it ‘disappointing’ that she had not been informed of O’Brien’s release from prison.

“I found out off someone else which is really disappointing,” she said.

Since the attack Charleen moved into a new apartment but felt that she couldn’t show off her new place on social media out of fear.

“I can’t have anyone even knowing the angle of my apartment, like I’ve never taken a picture of the view from my balcony even though the sun is so nice every evening,” she said.

“It sounds so stupid, but it’s just little things like that that you shouldn’t have to think about but you do.”

Earlier this month, Charleen and influencer pal Ellie Kelly warned people about posting information about their movements on social media.

“I think like it’s something everyone needs to do, whether you’re an influencer or not, we just have to be more savvy about being online, because it’s so new that people can know our locations from where we post,” she says.

“That would never have happened in the past, so it’s just really important that we be careful,” she said.

In January 2023, Charleen confirmed she had rekindled her relationship with long-term boyfriend, footballer Dano Mandroiu.

The happy couple appear to be going from strength to strength and recently sparked engagement rumours.