Valeriu Melnic jailed for eight years for manslaughter of Ion Daghi

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

Valeriu Melnic was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the manslaughter of Ion Daghi, with the final two years suspended for two years. Mr Justice David Keane backdated the sentence to May 15th, 2024, when Melnic entered custody. The sentencing was reported on November 20th, 2025.

Melnic had pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter at the commencement of his Central Criminal Court trial. The charge concerned the killing of Daghi at The Close, Sallins Park, Sallins, Co Kildare, on May 12th, 2024. A jury found him not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter on July 22nd, 2025.

The judge set a 13-year headline sentence and treated the manslaughter plea as a significant mitigating factor, although it had not been accepted by the Director of Public Prosecutions. He regarded Melnic’s heavy, voluntary intoxication as aggravating rather than mitigating.

The jury heard evidence that, before the stabbing, Melnic was squatting and trying to protect his head while Daghi held a chair leg and told him: “Stop or I’ll beat you.” The judge was satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that Melnic was not under deadly attack by Daghi and could have had no reasonable apprehension that he was.

Mr Justice Keane accepted that Melnic had started the verbal and physical altercation, but could not be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that there had been a considerable cooling-off period between the incident in the back garden and the fatal stabbing inside the house. A pathologist told the jury that Daghi died from a single stab wound to the chest.