Sean Healy withdraws appeal over €20,000 compensation order

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

Sean Healy withdrew his appeal against an order to pay €20,000 compensation after the Court of Appeal warned that custody could be considered. The proceedings were reported on 12 November 2018.

Healy pleaded guilty to assault causing harm to former hackney driver John Bailey. The assault happened at Cullenagh, Ballyporeen, in the early hours of 12 March 2017.

Judge Thomas Teehan gave Healy a wholly suspended three-and-a-half-year sentence and ordered him to pay Bailey €20,000. Clonmel Circuit Criminal Court heard that Bailey had decided to wind up his hackney business following the assault.

Healy’s barrister, Edward O’Mahoney BL, sought to confine the sentence appeal to the compensation order, arguing that the amount, with two years to pay, was “completely onerous”. Court of Appeal President Mr Justice George Birmingham said all aspects of the sentence would have to be considered, including the suspended sentence, and custody could be “back on the agenda”. After taking instructions, O’Mahoney said Healy wished to withdraw the appeal.

Mr Justice Birmingham said the sentencing judge viewed the offence as being at the higher end of the spectrum. He described it as an unprovoked assault by a trained boxer on a relatively elderly man who had to give up his employment. He also said Healy had no previous convictions. The court varied the compensation order to allow Healy two years to pay, although the source is ambiguous about when that period began.