The Court of Appeal has upheld a judge’s decision to jail a Kerry man for life for his role in killing a homeless man.
Christopher O’Sullivan of no fixed abode but originally from Kerry had pleaded guilty to manslaughter at the Central Criminal Court in Cork three years ago.
Mr O’Sullivan, who’s in his 40s, was sentenced to life imprisonment for his part in killing Timmy Hourihane in 2019.
Kerry man Christopher O’Sullivan, who had 48 previous convictions, punched, kicked, and stamped to death Mr Hourihane who was originally from Sheep’s Head in West Cork.
Another man was jailed for 11 years for the manslaughter of Timmy Hourihane who was attacked in Cork city where a group of homeless people had been living in tents.
Christopher O’Sullivan appealed his life sentence on a number of grounds including the discrepancy between the sentence he received and his co-accused.
His legal team argued that the judge in the Central Criminal Court had imprisoned Mr O’Sullivan to protect society from him.
They argued that such preventative detention is not allowed in Irish law, and that the correct headline sentence would have been 15 to 18 years.
The Irish Examiner reports that in delivering judgement in the Court of Appeal, Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy said Christopher O’Sullivan had an extremely high level of culpability for what was a severe and vicious attack.
Mr O’Sullivan had tried to avoid being linked to Timmy Hourihane’s killing by setting the victim’s tent on fire, disposing of evidence, and lying to gardaí.
Ms Justice Kennedy said his history of offending was a further aggravating factor, and that the trial judge was entitled to take this into account.
