The Court of Appeal has dismissed David O’Brien’s appeal against the severity of an eight-year sentence imposed for indecent assaults on four boys who were members of scout groups he led in the 1970s and early 1980s. The final 18 months of the sentence were suspended, and the sentencing court also ordered 12 months of post-release supervision.
O’Brien pleaded guilty to seven counts relating to four complainants. The counts concerned assaults described in the judgment as taking place during camping trips and other scouting activities. The sentencing judge imposed a combination of concurrent and consecutive terms, resulting in eight years’ imprisonment, backdated to account for time in custody after his previous sentence ended.
O’Brien argued that the sentence was excessive, particularly because the consecutive terms, when added to a 2015 sentence for similar offences against six other boys, produced an aggregate sentence of 14 years, with three years suspended. His appeal also relied on his guilty pleas, cooperation, remorse, age, personal circumstances, past efforts to seek help and the absence of known offending in later decades.
The Court of Appeal said it was not deciding whether an approach from an Australian case on considering sentences across separate proceedings should be adopted in Ireland. It found that issue unnecessary to resolve the appeal. The court rejected the argument that sentencing all the offences together would probably have produced a lower net term, saying a net 11 years could have been justified for serious indecent assaults against ten victims, aggravated by a breach of trust and exploitation of a leadership position.
The court also found that the sentencing judge had been fully aware of the earlier six-year sentence, including its suspended portion, and that the sentences in the present case took the overall criminality and punishment into account. It noted that a statutory procedure existed to ask for other offences to be taken into consideration when sentencing, but O’Brien had not sought to use it in 2015.
The appeal court rejected the separate argument that too little credit had been given for mitigation. It said the sentencing judge had referred to the factors relied on and had reduced the headline terms by an average of 50%, or more in some instances. Finding no error of principle and describing the overall sentence as proportionate and not crushing, the court dismissed the appeal.