Alan Curtis’s sentence increased for serious harm with a hurley

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

Alan Curtis was resentenced to five years in prison, with the final 12 months suspended, by the Court of Appeal on 11 October 2019. The Director of Public Prosecutions had successfully sought a review of his original sentence as unduly lenient.

Curtis pleaded not guilty to intentionally or recklessly causing serious harm to a then 16-year-old boy at Cashel Road, Crumlin, Dublin, on 28 March 2014. Despite claiming self-defence, he was convicted by a jury at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court and sentenced to four years in prison, with the final two years suspended.

Judge Terence O’Sullivan said Curtis had been at his mother’s house when an antisocial incident involving about 20 youths occurred outside. Curtis saw someone deliberately damage his car and identified the boy as the culprit. He took a hurley outside to drive the youths away.

The judge accepted that the boy had attempted to strike Curtis with a plank but missed. He said Curtis then followed the boy some distance and hit him with the hurley. The judge said the jury had taken the view that Curtis was no longer defending himself and had acted in revenge.

The boy suffered a depressed skull fracture and underwent an emergency operation. He was referred to the National Rehabilitation Hospital for treatment for the injury and resulting damage to his speech mechanism.

Giving judgment for the three-judge appeal court, Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy said no one could take the law into their own hands. He said the proper approach would have been to speak peacefully to the boys and, if that failed, call the gardaí. He sat with Mr Justice George Birmingham and Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy.