The Court of Appeal has dismissed Sean Farrell’s appeal against the severity of his eight-year prison sentence for assault causing serious harm. It found the term fell within the range open to the sentencing judge and that there was no error of principle.
Farrell was convicted by a jury in Dublin Circuit Court in May 2015. He had also appealed his conviction, but the Court of Appeal dismissed that challenge in June 2018. The judgment delivered on 2 October 2018 concerns only the sentence appeal.
The case arose from an attack in a car in June 2013. The judgment recounts evidence that Farrell was sitting behind Ryan Hickey when Hickey was cut several times across the head and neck with a Stanley blade. Hickey’s friend, who was in the front passenger seat, pulled the attacker away. Hickey suffered deep wounds, including one that cut through his ear. A medical report said he would have “very obvious extensive facial scarring long term”.
At trial, Hickey withdrew his earlier identification of Farrell and said a person known as “Whacker” was responsible. The jury heard Hickey’s earlier statements under section 16 of the Criminal Justice Act 2006 and convicted Farrell. Farrell admitted being in the car but denied the assault. The judgment records that the sentencing judge imposed eight years’ imprisonment, backdated to when Farrell entered custody, and declined to suspend any part of the term.
Farrell argued that the sentencing judge had not adequately accounted for mitigation, including his family circumstances, positive references and lack of convictions for violent offences. He also challenged the judge’s approach to rehabilitation and the sentence’s structure. The prosecution argued that the eight years was the final sentence after mitigation had been considered.
The appeal court said the sentencing judge’s reasoning was “largely opaque”, but considered it inherently unlikely that he had given no allowance for mitigation. It treated the eight-year term as a post-mitigation sentence. The court described the offending as premeditated and within the middle of the upper range of seriousness under the guideline ranges in *DPP v Fitzgibbon*. It said a starting point of ten years and a two-year reduction would have been justified, while a somewhat smaller reduction might also have been defensible.
The court concluded that the sentence was within the range the trial judge could legitimately impose. It also found that the judge had considered rehabilitation but rejected it in the circumstances, including Farrell’s continued denial of guilt. The court dismissed the appeal.