Eoin Reynolds
A convicted killer and his son have successfully appealed their sentences for assaulting another man and his son with a hammer and golf club while demanding payment of a €50 debt.
Robert Devine (44) and his son Lee Kelly (21), both of Brook Crescent, Clonmel, Co Tipperary, pleaded guilty in 2019 to burglary and assault at the home of PJ and Brian O'Reilly on December 17, 2017.
Judge Patrick Meghan sentenced Devine to 12 years for burglary and four years for each of two counts of assault on the O'Reillys. The judge ordered the sentences to run consecutively to make a total of 20 years, but he suspended the final eight. Kelly received 17 years in total with the final 10 suspended.
In an appeal earlier this year counsel for the two men said the trial judge had erred in imposing consecutive sentences for offences arising out of the same incident. Delivering the judgement of the three-judge Court of Appeal today Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy agreed.
Manslaughter conviction
Ms Justice Kennedy quashed the original sentences and substituted one of 12 years' imprisonment with the final two suspended for Devine and seven years and six months with the final year suspended for Kelly. The four-year sentences for assault remain but will run concurrently.
Devine has a previous manslaughter conviction having pleaded guilty in 2010 to killing 21-year-old Joseph Cummins in Waterford in November 2007. He received a 10-year sentence for that offence. Kelly played football for his county and was headhunted for the Irish boxing team.
Ms Justice Kennedy said the burglary and assault offences were "grave" and noted that the Director of Public Prosecutions had initially intended to charge both men with aggravated burglary but accepted a guilty plea to the lesser charge. She said: "In general, insofar as burglary offences are concerned, most perpetrators hope to avoid detection, however, this burglary is of quite a different character. The appellants invaded the victims’ dwelling for the specific purpose of engaging in a violent confrontation with the occupants. That alone places this offence within the upper range."
She described the assaults as a "savage and ferocious premeditated attack" and noted the "extraordinarily serious threats" made by Devine who, she said, had told his son "in effect to kill Mr O'Reilly". The evidence was that Devine shouted to his son, "finish him" during the assault on PJ O'Reilly.
Long-lasting injuries
Mr O'Reilly, Justice Kennedy said, sustained serious and long-lasting injuries. He was stabbed six times in the area around his cruciate ligament resulting in loss of mobility and balance. He suffers from sleeplessness and residual headaches following blows to the head from a hammer and a golf club. Ms Justice Kennedy added: "The impact on this family cannot be overstated, they no longer feel secure in their own home."
She also noted that Devine has "serious and relevant" previous convictions. Kelly, she said, was influenced and led by his father and in his favour was his intervention to pull his father away from Mr O'Reilly during the assault.
Further mitigating factors for both men included their guilty pleas, expressions of remorse, their personal circumstances and evidence that they were engaging with probation services in prison. She said the court wanted to incentivize both men to rehabilitate and had therefore suspended portions of their sentences.
Ms Justice Kennedy sat with the President of the Court of Appeal Mr Justice George Birmingham and Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy.
