A successful Dublin businessman who rugby tackled a woman to the ground and sexually assaulted her as she walked home at night has been jailed for 6 months.

53-year-old aviation broker Anthony Lyons of Griffith Avenue has also been ordered to pay €75,000 compensation to his 27-year-old victim who he attacked on October 3rd 2010.

The victim was walking along a North Dublin street in the early hours when she was grabbed by the businessman, pushed towards a wooded area and sexually assaulted until a passer-by heard her screams and her attacker fled.

The 53-year-old has never denied that he was the perpetrator but at his trial he argued that his new cholesterol medication was to blame and that he had been overcome by an irresistible urge.

The jury rejected the unusual defence.

Today Judge Desmond Hogan said the manner in which the attack was committed puts it at the higher end of scale as it involved violence of a seriously frightening nature.

But Anthony Lyons is considered at low risk of re-offending.

As a man of means the judge ordered him to pay the injured party €75,000 compensation.

However there were shocked gasps when he suspended all but 6 months of a 6-year prison sentence and outside court the granny of the victim simply said ‘money talks’.

A man in his 40s is due to appear in court in Dublin today charged in connection with an investigation into social welfare payment fraud.

It follows an operation involving several agencies here and in the UK.

The Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation, the Special Investigations Unit of the Department of Social Protection, and the Fraud Investigation Service at the UK Department of Work and Pensions all took part in the inquiry.

The man is due to appear at the Criminal Courts of Justice later.

Tenants could be asked to handover their rent money to banks rather than their landlords.

AIB and EBS are believed to have engaged rent receivers to collect money owed to them by landlords on buy-to-let mortgages.

The rent receiver will ask tenants in the houses to pay the bank directly.

Former CEO of Bank of Ireland Mike Soden says many of the people who took out buy to let mortgages used the money to fund lavish lifestyles.

He says there is no doubt some people are strategically holding on to rent because they know that debt relief will be part of new personal insolvency rules.

The Syrian army claims it has taken over part of a rebel stronghold in the city of Aleppo.

Around 200,000 civilians have fled the northern city in the past 2 days seeking refuge in neighbouring countries.

However there is some confusion as to the real picture in Aleppo as rebels say they have fought back regime forces this morning.

Nearly half of us think it is acceptable to slap a child.

That is just one of the findings of the latest Newstalk Nation survey which looked at attitudes to children.

46%of people also admitted to having slapped a child themselves.

Newstalk’s Jack Quann has been looking at the results.