The Court of Appeal has dismissed an appeal against the severity of an eight-year prison sentence imposed on Brian Collopy for a drugs offence involving diamorphine, commonly known as heroin.
The court said an appropriate pre-mitigation headline sentence would have been 12 years, with some margin on either side. But it found that the signed guilty plea justified a substantial discount and that the sentence imposed was within the sentencing judge’s discretion. It found no error of principle.
Collopy had pleaded guilty to several drugs offences arising from a seizure at two connected properties in Limerick. At Limerick Circuit Criminal Court, he received eight years for the offence under section 15 of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977, backdated to 15 December 2015. The sentencing judge made no order on the other two charges, which arose from the same seizure. Collopy appealed only against the severity of the sentence.
The Court of Appeal’s judgment recounted evidence that Gardaí found 264.44 grams of diamorphine, with an estimated market value of €37,000, in a shared kitchen area. The search also uncovered weighing equipment, drug traces and cash. The prosecution’s evidence was that the brothers were involved at a high level in distribution; both men denied knowing the drugs were at the property when questioned at the scene.
The appeal focused on whether the sentencing judge had properly accounted for mitigation, including Collopy’s signed plea at the earliest opportunity and his material assistance to the prosecution. The prosecution accepted both points. Collopy argued that the judge had not clearly explained how he arrived at eight years after identifying a six-to-10-year range.
The Court of Appeal said the sentencing judge’s wording was unclear about whether that range referred to a pre-mitigation or final sentence. Reading the remarks as a whole, however, it concluded that the judge meant the post-mitigation range. The court said the eight-year term was lenient in its view, but consistent with that interpretation.
It said the signed plea was rare in section 15A cases and required a very substantial reduction—about one third from the 12-year headline sentence it considered appropriate. The plea and assistance were sufficiently material and exceptional to justify departing from the presumptive minimum sentence in the circumstances. The court therefore dismissed the appeal, leaving the eight-year sentence in place.