FF: END SOFT SENTENCES FOR VIOLENT CRIMINALS
Maximum jail terms ‘must not be too lenient’
POLITICIANS need to change the law so judges are not forced to impose soft sentences on violent criminals, Fianna Fáil has said.
The call by the party’s justice spokesman, Jim O’Callaghan, comes in the wake of an Irish Daily Mail/Ireland Thinks poll which found that 83% of Irish people are in favour of more
severe sentences for perpetrators of vicious attacks.
Mr O’Callaghan, who is also a barrister, told the Mail that the Oireachtas has its part to play on sentencing and making sure jail terms are ‘not so lenient’. He said: ‘The
Oireachtas can and should play a greater role in setting the penalties in setting the penalties for violent crimes that can be imposed by courts.
‘At present, most criminal laws passed by the Oireachtas set out the maximum penalty that can be imposed by a court.
‘The Oireachtas needs to ensure that these maximum penalties are not so lenient that they unduly restrict the capacity of a court to penalise harshly persons found guilty of serious violent offences.’
The Irish Daily Mail has throughout this week highlighted a series of cases where individuals were found guilty of horrific assaults only to handed relatively short, or even a suspended, sentences.
In one example earlier this month, former AIB banker, Robert Jones, was given a suspended sentence for the second time despite blinding a medical student in one eye.
Jones first walked free with an 18-month suspended sentence in February of last year but that was appealed by the DPP. Then this month the three appeal court judges ruled that while the original sentence was ‘unduly lenient’, it wouldn’t be fair to send Jones to prison 13 months after he was set free the first time, as he had already suffered enough ‘hardship’ waiting for his sentence to be reviewed.
Also this month, the victim of a nightclub glass attack voiced her dismay after her attacker Ciara Killeen – a former partner of Limerick murderer John Dundon – walked free from Ennis Circuit Court on receiving a two-and-a-half-year suspended sentence.
A number of Independent TDs have also backed the public’s call for tougher sentences for violent crime. Independent TD Michael Healy-Rae said that as judges can only operate within the legislation governing violent crimes, the law needs to be looked at. He said the severity of assaults seems to be ‘getting worse’. He said: ‘There has to be a deterrent. There’s no point in excuses like the attacker was from a disadvantaged background or was down on their luck. ‘That’s no excuse. ‘Violent assaults like kicking on the ground or glassings are outrageous. They are attempts to maim the person.
‘When you hit someone like that in a ferocious way, you don’t know the damage you’ll do. That shouldn’t be tolerated and there should be tougher sentences.’
The maximum penalty for assault causing harm is currently five years but this is regularly reduced when mitigating circumstances such as an early guilty plea, difficult personal circumstances, or a lack of previous convictions are taken into account.
Mr Healy-Rae said: ‘Five years [as a maximum] is not enough because if you look at some of the results, the victim carries the result of the assault with them.’ Independent TD Mattie McGrath says mandatory minimum sentences for violent assaults should be legislated for.
Speaking to the Mail, he said: ‘We need much harder sentences. Any assault should bring with it much longer sentences. We need to examine the whole system because it’s outdated. It needs to be addressed, the legislation.
‘I’d be in support of having a five-year mandatory sentence [for violent assaults] and then for them to go and do community duties or some form of retribution, that something is given back to the community.
‘Suspended sentences are unbelievable. They are a waste of the gardaí and the courts time. We need a root and branch review and we need options available.’
Minimum mandatory sentences have already been introduced in the case of some drugs and firearms offences.
A spokesperson for the Department of Justice said that while the possible introduction of minimum mandatory sentences for robbing someone’s home is currently under review, no such review is underway for violent crimes.
A spokesperson said: ‘A range of sentences are available to judges in cases of violent crime depending on the charges brought by the Director of Public Prosecutions.
‘When coming to a decision on the appropriate sentence in the cases before them judges consider all the circumstances of the individual case to determine the appropriate sentence.
‘Available sentences for violent crime are significant. For example, assault causing serious harm, robbery and aggravated burglary are all punishable by up to imprisonment for life. Again, these are kept under continuing review.’
Comment – Page 12 darren.hassett@dailymail.ie
Assaults ‘getting worse’ ‘Five years is not enough’