DPP v Dewey

JurisdictionIreland
JudgeMr. Justice Edwards
Judgment Date05 February 2019
Neutral Citation[2019] IECA 29
Docket NumberRecord No: 181/2018
CourtCourt of Appeal (Ireland)
Date05 February 2019
THE DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS
RESPONDENT
V
MARK DEWEY
APPLICANT

[2019] IECA 29

Record No: 181/2018

THE COURT OF APPEAL

Extension of time – Sentencing – Possession of drugs for sale or supply – Applicant seeking an extension of time within which to appeal against the severity of sentence – Whether the interests of justice required the extending of time for the purposes of an appeal against the severity of the sentence imposed

Facts: The applicant, Mr Dewey, was before Cork Circuit Court pursuant to a signed plea of guilty to an offence contrary to s. 15A of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977. The offence involved being in possession of drugs for sale or supply with a value in excess of €13,000. The matter was initially before the court on the 24th October 2017, and he subsequently received a sentence of seven years imprisonment with the final two years suspended on the 23rd November 2017. Mr Dewey did not appeal within twenty-eight days. He applied to the Court of Appeal for an extension of time within which to appeal against the severity of sentence.

Held by the Court that, due to the singular lack of engagement with the facts of the case, and with the evidence that was put forward at the sentencing hearing, it had not been persuaded that the interests of justice required the extending of time in this case for the purposes of an appeal against the severity of the sentence imposed.

The Court held that the application would be refused.

Application refused.

JUDGMENT of the Court ( ex tempore) delivered on the 5th February 2019 by Mr. Justice Edwards .
1

The court has arrived with a view in this matter. This is an application for an extension of time within which to appeal against the severity of a sentence. The applicant, Mr Dewey, was before Cork Circuit Court pursuant to a signed plea of guilty to an offence contrary to s.15A of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977. The matter was initially before that court on the 24th October 2017, and he was subsequently sentenced on the 23rd November 2017. The offence involved being in possession of drugs for sale or supply with a value in excess of €13,000, and we were told that the evidence had been that he was found in possession of three different categories of drugs, namely cocaine, cannabis herb, and methylenedioxymethamphetamine, commonly referred to as MDMA or ‘ecstasy’. The prosecution's case was that the value of these drugs in aggregate amounted to €13,000 or more.

2

On the date of his sentencing, which as I have said occurred on the 23rd November 2017, Mr Dewey received a sentence of seven years imprisonment with the final two years of the said sentence suspended. It requires to be recorded that an offence under s. 15A of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977 carries with it a potential penalty of up to life imprisonment and a presumptive mandatory minimum sentence of ten years” imprisonment, but which presumptive minimum can be departed from if the judge is of the view that there are exceptional and specific circumstances relating to the offence, or the person convicted of the offence, which would make a sentence of not less than 10 years imprisonment unjust in all the circumstances. It is to be presumed, although we don't have a transcript, that the Circuit Court Judge in this instance must have been so satisfied because he imposed a sentence that was considerably below the presumptive minimum.

3

Mr Dewey did not appeal within twenty-eight days. He was out of time and concedes in his affidavit that he was out of time but it has to be said that he was not enormously out of time. I think he was one month and twenty-three days out of time in as much as he...

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1 cases
  • DPP v Courtney Walsh and Kirsty Walsh
    • Ireland
    • High Court
    • 31 Agosto 2021
    ...Continental principles. Counsel for the DPP also directs this court's attention to the recent Court of Appeal decision in DPP v Dewey [2019] IECA 29 in which Mr. Justice Edwards stated as follows: “It is clear since the decision of the Supreme Court in The People v Eamonn O'Kelly [1980] 2 I......

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