Anthony Lyons jailed for sexual assault sentence appeal

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

Anthony Lyons’s six-month custodial sentence for sexual assault was ruled too lenient by the Court of Criminal Appeal on 18 November 2013. The three-judge court upheld the State’s appeal against the sentence length.

Lyons had been sentenced by Judge Desmond Hogan at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court in July 2012 to six years, with five and a half years suspended. He was also ordered to pay €75,000 compensation.

Lyons pleaded not guilty to sexual assault and was convicted by a jury. He admitted the attack but said alcohol, cholesterol medicine and cough syrup had caused an “irresistible urge”; his barrister said an involuntary-intoxication defence required denying the charge.

The appeal court said the custodial part of the sentence was not justified by the mitigating factors. The case was to return the following week for submissions on an appropriate jail term.