Mary and Michael Clarke have just returned from visiting their son Niall (26) in Cumberland County Jail in Maine where he is awaiting sentence. He pleaded guilty to the charges after a highprofile arrest minutes after he burst into a Bank of America branch with a gun in Bangor, Maine, last October.

He faces up to 25 years in prison on a charge of armed robbery and a mandatory minimum consecutive sentence of seven years for brandishing a weapon.

Clarke seemed well on his way to a successful future when he set up his own computer software company after graduation from Trinity College in 2002. He won the Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award and had previously been chosen to participate in the International Maths Olympiad.

However, his parents noticed a major change in his character after he developed serious psychiatric problems and pushed people who were close to him away.

His mother Mary Clarke said, "If we had got the help we needed Niall would not be where he is today. We feel that the system has failed us completely as we had tried everything and left no stone unturned. We explored every avenue but we could not get help. We never want any parent to go through what we went through with Niall, " she said.

The Clarkes failed in their efforts to get doctors to commit their son, the secondeldest of four children, to a mental institution, and every time they had encouraged him to seek help voluntarily, they found that there were long waiting lists for private psychiatrists.

"When we would get Niall to a point where he was willing to see somebody, we couldn't get an appointment with a psychiatrist, " said Mary. "Irish doctors have failed our son."

Michael Clarke added, "We need a more balanced approach to mental health care in Ireland. While we have big drug and contraceptive awareness programmes, there should be major mental health awareness campaigns for our youth."

Niall's family want it known that even though their son committed a crime "he is not a criminal and just needs help".

Mary said, "We just pray that the American system can help him. He might get help in jail." Michael added, "We don't want anybody to wave a magic wand. We just want to get proper medical care for him."