The Court of Appeal increased Craig Mc Grath’s manslaughter sentence from five to seven years after finding that the original term was unduly lenient. It left unchanged a separate 2½-year sentence for assault causing harm. The two sentences are to run consecutively, with the final two years of the manslaughter sentence suspended for two years on the same conditions imposed by the Circuit Court.
The Director of Public Prosecutions brought the appeal under section 2 of the Criminal Justice Act 1993, arguing that both sentences and the suspension arrangement failed to reflect the seriousness of the offences. The appeal concerned sentences imposed after Mc Grath pleaded guilty to both offences.
The manslaughter followed an assault in Waterford on 7 July 2017. The judgment said Mc Grath punched Damien O’Brien twice with force that caused serious facial injuries before O’Brien fell and suffered a fatal skull fracture and brain injuries. O’Brien died on 13 July. The court also considered an earlier, unprovoked assault on Kiefer Dowling at a Waterford nightclub on 18 August 2017, in which a punch knocked Dowling unconscious. Mc Grath committed that offence while subject to a suspended sentence; he was on bail for the assault charge when the manslaughter occurred.
The Court of Appeal said the manslaughter was at the higher end of the medium culpability category in guidance from the Supreme Court. It highlighted the force and number of punches, the injuries caused before O’Brien struck the ground, and the similarity and close timing of the earlier assault. Those circumstances, the court said, distinguished the case from another “one-punch” manslaughter appeal cited by the parties. It assessed the appropriate headline sentence at 8½ to nine years and the sentence after mitigation at seven years.
The Circuit Court had imposed a seven-year headline sentence, reduced it to five years for mitigation, and then suspended two years of the combined sentences under the totality principle and to encourage rehabilitation. The Court of Appeal said the original assessment of the manslaughter’s gravity was wrong in principle and that a combined immediate custodial term of 5½ years was inadequate. It also considered positive rehabilitation material, including vocational and other courses completed in custody, and suspended the final two years of the revised manslaughter term.
The appeal did not change the 2½-year assault sentence. The substituted manslaughter term is to run consecutively to it. The court’s order replaced the Circuit Court’s suspension arrangement and retained the same conditions.