The Court of Appeal has replaced a fully suspended three-year sentence imposed on F.B. for threatening to kill and assault with a three-year prison term, suspending the final 18 months. It also set aside the Cork Circuit Criminal Court’s sentencing order and directed that the sentence run from 1 June 2018, the date of the appeal judgment.
The case came before the court on an application by the Director of Public Prosecutions under section 2 of the Criminal Justice Act. The appeal concerned the sentence imposed on 28 July 2017, after F.B. pleaded guilty to threatening to kill and assault causing harm under section 3. The DPP did not challenge the three-year term itself, but argued that suspending it in full was unduly lenient.
The offences arose from incidents at the family home in rural County Cork on 1 October 2012 and 4 October 2015. The court described the 2012 assault as serious and the 2015 offence as “truly awful”, saying F.B.’s actions must have terrified family members. The injured party in the assault charge was his wife, identified as MB. The judgment also refers to victim impact reports from MB and their eldest daughter, KB.
At the original sentencing, the Circuit Court judge set a five-year headline sentence, reduced it by one year for the absence of relevant previous convictions and by another year for the guilty plea. The resulting three-year term was suspended for three years, on condition that F.B. maintain contact with mental health services. The judge referred to concern about a lack of insight into the causes of the outbursts, but considered that the breakdown of the family unit made a recurrence less likely.
The Court of Appeal said the 2015 offence was so serious that it could only have been dealt with by a custodial sentence. It considered that three years with the final 12 months suspended would have been an appropriate sentence at the Circuit Court stage. But, taking account of information about events since then and the passage of time, it imposed three years with the final 18 months suspended for the 2015 offence. It also restructured the sentence to include a 12-month concurrent term for the section 3 assault.
The court set aside the Circuit Court order and directed F.B. to enter a bond for the suspended portion. The judgment does not identify the later information the court considered.