The Court of Appeal allowed the Director of Public Prosecutions’ challenge to James Maher’s sentence and added one year to it, in an ex tempore judgment delivered on 10 February 2015.
The court said the application had to succeed because, without some consecutive sentencing, the overall sentence would be “clearly inadequate and unjustifiable”. It said it would have imposed a consecutive sentence of two years, but reduced that to one year after considering the circumstances it identified.
The court said the maximum sentence for indecent assault on a male during the relevant period in this case was two years, rather than ten. It described that as an unintended and unexpected result and said this was the starting point for the maximum sentence.
The appeal court had previously concluded that the sentencing judge erred in principle by failing to impose consecutive sentences. It said its finding that the sentences were unduly lenient did not reject the mitigating circumstances considered below. Rather, the sentencing court had failed to take account of aggravating circumstances relating to the crimes.
In deciding the sentence anew, the Court of Appeal also noted that Maher had served the sentence originally imposed and would have to return to prison. It acknowledged the anxiety caused by the DPP’s challenge and the period during which the possibility of renewed imprisonment had remained unresolved. The court said it nevertheless had a duty to act.
The order added a one-year sentence. The judgment does not state the original sentence’s length or give further details of the underlying offences.