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Irish Court of Criminal Appeal
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> Irish Court of Criminal Appeal >> O'Driscoll, D.P.P. (People) v. [2008] IECCA 121 (20 October 2008)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/ie/cases/IECCA/2008/2008_IECCA_121.html
Cite as: [2008] IECCA 121
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Kearns J.
Budd J.
Clark J.
[104 CJA/08]
IN THE MATTER OF SECTION 2 OF THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE ACT, 1993
BETWEEN
THE PEOPLE AT THE SUIT OF THE DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS
APPLICANT
AND
RESPONDENT
JUDGMENT of the Court (ex tempore) delivered the 20th day of October, 2008 by Kearns J.
On 27th February, 2008 the respondent, Lee O'Driscoll, received a five year prison term, with three of that five years suspended, for the offence of being in possession of a haul of cocaine on the 28th November,
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2006 at his place of work in Cork. That stash of cocaine was divided up into different units, but it had a total value of €122,000, so this was not a trivial offence, nor is it an offence which was prompted by circumstances of vulnerability or dependency on alcohol or drugs on the part of the respondent. Here was a man who was drugs-free and who admitted to the investigating gardai that he had been engaging in handling controlled drugs for six to twelve months. He was a storeman and delivery man for a drug group and was using premises where he worked as the place where he concealed the drugs. This is a particularly reprehensible aspect of this case as it gave rise to the possibility that others, co-workers, could be wrongly suspected of involvement in these activities. The respondent chose to engage in these activities solely for the purpose of making money, notwithstanding the fact that he was in good employment. He had a steadfast partner and two children to mind and he had been with the same employer for seven years.
Now obviously the Court does take into account the fact that he was twenty-four years of age at the time. He is a young man, he is now only twenty-six years of age and obviously the requirement to facilitate rehabilitation must be factored in to the sentence, as indeed must the fact that he had no previous convictions. However the legislature has made it clear that a very severe view must be taken of these offences and, having regard to the value of this haul, the Court is required to consider a
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sentence ranging from a life sentence to a provisional mandatory minimum sentence of ten years and it is only where there are specific and exceptional circumstances that the Court should depart from that lower minimum threshold.
In this case the Court has decided, having regard to the value of this particular cache, that there was a substantial departure from the sentence that was appropriate. It is going to increase the sentence but not to such an extent that would ignore the number of positive features which existed in the case of this young man. It will increase the sentence to eight years but will suspend the last four years of that sentence. So it will be four years imprisonment and the balance of four years will be suspended on the same terms as heretofore.