The Court of Appeal upheld Philip Daly’s five-year sentence for a Balbriggan supermarket robbery but suspended the final 12 months of a separate two-year sentence for burglary. The court said the sentencing judge had made an error of principle in imposing the consecutive sentence without considering whether part of it should be suspended.
The ex tempore judgment was delivered on 24 June 2016 by Mr Justice Sheehan, with Justices Birmingham and Mahon also on the court. Daly had appealed the total seven-year prison term imposed by Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on 28 May 2014.
Daly pleaded guilty to robbing a Balbriggan supermarket on 23 June 2012. The judgment says he entered disguised and carrying a small black imitation handgun and a knife, demanded that staff open the till, and left with €400. About a week later, a café in Balbriggan was burgled at 4.25am, with approximately €400 stolen. Daly was seen running from the premises, arrested, and later convicted after a four-day jury trial. He denied involvement in the burglary.
The appeal challenged the overall proportionality of the sentences, the decision to make the burglary sentence consecutive, and whether the totality principle had been considered. The appeal court found the five-year robbery sentence proportionate. It said it could not tell what allowance, if any, had been made for the late guilty plea, but that this did not invalidate the sentence.
On the burglary sentence, the court noted that consecutive sentences are used sparingly and that the burglary involved unoccupied premises, an offence type normally dealt with in the District Court. It concluded that the sentencing judge should have considered suspending part of the second sentence. The court also heard evidence that Daly was making progress in prison and had re-engaged with some of his children.
The court therefore upheld the five-year robbery sentence and varied the burglary sentence: the two-year term remains consecutive, but its final 12 months are suspended. The judgment does not state further conditions for the suspension.