Appellant:  Paterson, Sol Adv;  Paterson Bell, Edinburgh

Respondent:  Brown, QC, AD;  Crown Agent

20 November 2014

[1]        The circumstances of the murder are summarised in paragraph 4 of the opinion of Lord Eassie [2014] HCJAC 104, as follows:

“The appellant and the deceased were known to each other and both lived in Dunoon.  The appellant lived with his girlfriend Nicole Larese.  Seemingly some damage had been caused maliciously to the house which the appellant and Nicole Larese occupied and on the evening of the crime libelled the appellant received information that the person responsible for the commission of that damage was the deceased.  That information angered the appellant.  The appellant changed into dark clothing, took a knife from a drawer in the kitchen, and then proceeded to the house of the deceased, Mark McGauchie.  The evidence established that the deceased died shortly thereafter while making an emergency 999 call from the telephone in the living room of his house.  He had suffered wounds, one of which was a stab wound which had penetrated an artery leading to his heart.”

[2]        The appellant’s special defence of self-defence was rejected by the jury.  That being so, the circumstances point to a premeditated revenge attack with a knife, inflicted on the deceased in his own home, the appellant having purposely travelled to and entered the deceased’s home armed with the knife.  That, on any view, was a very grave offence.  If the appellant’s record of previous convictions is also taken into account, including as it does convictions for assault and robbery, we find ourselves unable to criticise the punishment part of 20 years selected by the trial judge.  Other authorities are of course helpful, but never definitive in sentencing.  The appeal is refused. 

SM