The Court of Appeal has replaced a 10-year sentence, with the final three years suspended, with a six-year prison term for Liam O’Connell, who pleaded guilty to possessing drugs worth €269,109.
The court said the original sentencing judge had not followed best practice in addressing the presumptive 10-year minimum under the Misuse of Drugs Act. It found that an early guilty plea and material assistance to the investigation could justify a departure from that minimum. The appeal court held that the 10-year headline sentence itself was appropriate, but that the reduction for mitigation was insufficient.
The offence arose from a search on 27 October 2017 at O’Connell’s home in Kinsale. According to evidence heard by the court, he directed gardaí to bags in his bedroom and continued to cooperate. They recovered several kilograms of cannabis and smaller amounts of cocaine and MDMA, valued in total at €269,109, along with a ledger described as a tick list.
In interview, O’Connell admitted moving cannabis in quantities of 22kg, 18kg and 12kg on separate occasions, and previously delivering a kilogram of MDMA. The judgment said these admissions were corroborated by a telephone examination and the tick list. A detective sergeant accepted that O’Connell had fully cooperated, made significant admissions, accepted responsibility for the drugs, and received €6,700 over the course of his offending. He had no previous convictions and pleaded guilty at the first opportunity.
The appeal court described the offending as commercial drug dealing at a significant level, involving multiple drug types, dealing indicators and an admitted history of earlier dealing. It rejected the complaint that the headline sentence was too high. However, it said O’Connell had “very strong mitigation”, including his guilty plea, cooperation, lack of convictions, employment history and long service with the RNLI, during which he took part in hazardous sea rescues.
The court concluded that the effective 30% reduction in the original sentence was not enough in light of those circumstances and amounted to an error of principle. It quashed the sentence imposed by the Circuit Criminal Court. On resentencing, it set a headline term of 11 years, then applied a five-year reduction and departed from the presumptive minimum, imposing six years’ imprisonment.
The judgment does not specify any suspended portion of the new sentence or add further conditions to it.