The Court of Appeal has upheld the Irish Prison Service method of calculating standard sentence remission by days rather than calendar months, rejecting an appeal brought by Cornelius Price over a disputed 24 hours in custody.
Price had been sentenced on February 24, 2017 to three years' imprisonment for endangerment, with the sentence dated from February 17, 2017. Standard remission of one quarter applied.
The dispute concerned whether his sentence ended at midnight on May 17, 2019 or midnight the following day. Price argued that three years should be treated as 36 months, giving nine months' remission and leaving 27 months to serve.
The Prison Service instead converted the sentence into days. Three non-leap years amounted to 1,095 days. Applying three-quarters produced 821.25 days, which was rounded down to 821 days, giving a release date of May 18.
Price brought an Article 40 challenge while still detained. The High Court ruled on May 17, 2019 that his detention remained lawful. By the time the appeal reached the Court of Appeal he had long since been released, but the legal issue proceeded.
The Court of Appeal held that the day-based calculation was logical, accurate and produced equal treatment for prisoners serving identical sentences regardless of the month in which their sentence began.
By contrast, calendar months vary between 28 and 31 days. The court said using months could therefore produce different periods in custody for prisoners given identical terms, depending simply on when their sentences started.
The judges also rejected the argument that uncertainty required the interpretation most favourable to liberty. They found no relevant ambiguity in the Prison Service method.
The court concluded that Price’s remission had been correctly calculated and that his detention during the 24-hour period between midnight on May 17 and midnight on May 18, 2019 was lawful. The appeal was dismissed.