The Supreme Court dismissed David Mahon’s appeal against his seven-year sentence for manslaughter, leaving the sentence in place. It said the sentencing judge should have explained which facts she accepted as proved after the jury’s verdict, but the Supreme Court could not reassess those facts because it had not heard the trial.
A jury found Mahon guilty of manslaughter, but not murder, over the fatal stabbing of Dean Fitzpatrick in May 2013. The trial judge sentenced him to seven years in prison. The Court of Appeal had already refused Mahon’s sentence appeal.
The Supreme Court explained that a manslaughter verdict on a murder charge does not necessarily mean jurors accepted the accused’s account of an accident. It may mean they were not satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that he intended to kill or cause serious injury. Here, the jury had been directed to acquit if it was not satisfied the death was non-accidental, so its verdict ruled out the defence account of a blameless accident.
Where a verdict could rest on different factual routes, a sentencing judge may, in rare cases, ask the jury which route it accepted. The judge must not question jurors about their reasoning. If the verdict remains ambiguous, the judge must independently decide the facts needed for sentencing, applying the criminal standard of proof. The sentencing remarks should briefly set out the facts accepted as proved beyond reasonable doubt.
The Supreme Court found that the trial judge had not provided that factual narrative. It said the Court of Appeal could not now determine what facts were open to her because it had not heard the evidence. It therefore relied on the sentencing remarks that were available.
Those remarks supported what the Supreme Court described as a lenient view: culpability based on introducing and brandishing a knife, followed by a spontaneous action or collision. The judgment also identified aggravating circumstances, including Mahon coming after Fitzpatrick with a knife, leaving without seeking help and disposing of the weapon. The court placed the sentence in the medium-culpability range and said it should not be disturbed. It expressly declined to say whether the trial judge could have taken a more serious view of the facts.