The Court of Appeal changed the sentence imposed on Gerard Glynn for an attempted robbery and threat to kill in Dún Laoghaire, ruling that backdating it had made the sentence unduly lenient. It said the change should result in his release in September 2020, with the precise date to be calculated by prison authorities.
The Director of Public Prosecutions brought the appeal under section 2 of the Criminal Justice Act 1993, arguing that the sentence was unduly lenient. Mr Glynn had pleaded guilty to both offences, which arose from an incident at an ATM on Queen’s Road on 25 June 2017. The trial court imposed four years’ imprisonment, with the final two years suspended, and backdated the sentence to 12 March 2019, when he was charged and remanded in custody.
The judgment recounts that Mr and Mrs Doyle were at the ATM when Mr Glynn tried to grab money Mrs Doyle had withdrawn. Mr Doyle said Mr Glynn threatened to “stick” him and lunged towards his wife. The men fell during Mr Doyle’s intervention, and Mr Glynn fled towards the DART station. Mr Glynn later denied involvement while in custody.
At sentencing, Mr Glynn was already serving a four-and-a-half-year sentence, with 18 months suspended, for a separate attempted robbery. He had 18 previous convictions, including three for robbery, two for burglary and one for assault. The sentencing judge identified violence and two injured parties as aggravating factors, and cited his circumstances, guilty plea and rehabilitation efforts in mitigation. In custody, he had attended education and drug counselling and reduced his daily physeptone dose.
The Court of Appeal said the four-year sentence with two years suspended was “very lenient”, but was not, by itself, unduly lenient. It accepted that the sentencing judge had put rehabilitation at the forefront. The error, it held, was backdating the sentence, which left no additional custodial time to serve after the earlier sentence.
The appeal court reduced the sentence to two years and four months, suspended the final two years, and ordered it to run consecutively to the sentence for the separate attempted robbery. It said this arrangement would ensure an additional period in custody and expected release in September 2020. The court limited its intervention, citing Mr Glynn’s continued progress, a place arranged for him at Priorswood House through Fr McVerry’s Trust, and the importance of rehabilitation. The judgment does not specify the exact release date.