Ryan Fitzpatrick appealed sentence for Garda information corruption

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

Ryan Fitzpatrick appealed the severity of his sentence for corruption and perverting the course of justice. The visible Court of Appeal judgment excerpt does not disclose the appeal’s outcome.

Fitzpatrick pleaded guilty to both charges on 21 March 2024. At Dublin Circuit Criminal Court, he admitted attempting to destroy a mobile phone linked to a particular SIM card in Malahide on 27 May 2020. He also admitted corruptly offering a gift to Lauryn McCann to convince her to do an act in relation to her employment, on a date unknown.

On 29 April 2024, Judge Martin Nolan sentenced Fitzpatrick. The Journal reported that he imposed four years with the final three months suspended, allowing for time spent in custody. The appeal judgment describes a three-year-nine-month sentence on the corruption count, with the other count taken into consideration, and says the judge reduced the sentence by three months to reflect time already served, including custody in Spain.

The sentencing court heard that gardaí recovered a SIM card from Fitzpatrick’s damaged phone and linked it to messages and images from the Garda PULSE system sent by McCann. Fitzpatrick later left the jurisdiction and was brought back to Ireland on a European Arrest Warrant.

Fitzpatrick argued on appeal that his sentence was unduly severe, that insufficient weight was given to his circumstances and that the person providing unauthorised information should receive a more serious sentence than its recipient. The respondent argued that no such sentencing principle existed and that the sentence was appropriate. The judgment was dated 4 January 2025.

This report covers an earlier stage of the case. Later developments are not reported here.