Man shot seven horses and a dog over ‘some gripe or other’

A DUHALLOW man who had “some gripe or other” against his uncle and shot seven horses and a dog was sentenced to 18 months in prison at Cork Circuit Criminal court this week.

The main charges to which Tom O’Connor (32) of Clonfert, Newmarket pleaded guilty were the discharging of weapons. Detective Sergeant Hugh Twomey told Judge Seán Ó Donnabháin that on September 9, 2017, gardai were approached in the early hours of the morning about the discharge of a firearm in a farmyard.

As reported in The Irish Examiner this week, Denis McCarthy told gardai his dog had been shot and that shots were also discharged into his 4x4 car, which was parked outside the house.

Mr McCarthy told gardai he came out and confronted the man, whom he recognised as his wife’s nephew, Tom O’Connor, who left the scene. Mr McCarthy later found that one of his horses had been shot dead at the back of the house.

Earlier in the morning, Mr McCarthy’s son, Denis Gerard McCarthy, found six of his horses had been shot on his property. As reported in The Irish Examiner, there was a report of O’Connor trying to drive his car through the gates of a property. He was eventually located at a house in Newmarket and his car was found crashed a short distance from the house.

When he was arrested and questioned, he told gardai where he had discarded a rifle and where this firearm was located.

Alice Fawsitt said her client was diagnosed with a mental condition known as mixed affective disorder. She said he had the capacity to instruct his legal team and was fit to plead to the offences.

She said: “Nothing like this ever happened in the past. A large number of his family members are here in court to support him. He was out of work at the time.”

Judge Seán Ó Donnabháin said: “He used that firearm to kill a number of horses and a dog. He said he had some gripe or other”. “Then he went along and shot the animals. “To shoot six horses with a single-bore rifle is an act of unspeakable cruelty, not in any way explained by the real or imagined gripe he had against the person. There is no explanation for what this man did on the night in question,” he said.

The judge said O’Connor had been on a proper regime of medication under the direction of a competent doctor, but that he had decided to go online and top up his medication with other tablets sourced on the internet.

The judge imposed a total sentence of three years, with half of it suspended.