The Court of Appeal has dismissed an appeal against the severity of a three-year prison sentence imposed on M. T. for assault causing harm to his then wife.
M. T. pleaded guilty to the offence on 9 October 2017 and was sentenced on 11 December that year. The sentence was backdated to 20 November 2017. The appeal court’s ex tempore judgment, delivered on 27 November 2018, said it had been redacted to preserve the victim’s anonymity.
The offence occurred in December 2015 at accommodation in Rathmines, Dublin, where the couple were staying. Evidence at the sentencing hearing was that the victim’s new employment had become a source of dispute. The court’s account said M. T. grabbed her by the neck, punched her in the face and hit the back of her head. She lost consciousness and was later diagnosed with fractures to both sides of her jaw, along with other injuries.
The sentencing judge described the offence as a particularly serious example of domestic violence and assessed a headline sentence of four and a half years. He imposed three years after allowing for mitigating circumstances, including the guilty plea, remorse and character references. The appeal court said the resulting 18-month reduction, or 33.3%, was adequate.
M. T. argued that the sentencing judge gave too little weight to mitigation, including his new relationship and the fact that his partner was expecting a child, his remorse, guilty plea, lack of previous convictions and status as a foreign national. He also challenged the judge’s description of him as a man of violent disposition.
The appeal court said a sentencing judge could give little or no weight to the new relationship and expected child in the circumstances. It read the sentencing judge’s remarks as addressing responsibility for the offence, rather than ruling out those circumstances as potentially mitigating. It found no error of principle.
The court also concluded that the sentencing judge had accepted a degree of remorse, while taking account of the fact that M. T. did not admit the offence until his third Garda interview. It said the challenged reference to a “man of violent disposition” concerned the violence in this incident, not a general tendency. The court rejected the remaining grounds and dismissed the appeal.