A ROSCOMMON MAN who repeatedly sexually assaulted a teenage girl who babysat his children has had his five-and-a-half-year jail term reduced by 15 months at the Court of Appeal.
Michael King (53) abused the girl at locations in Roscommon over a nine-month period, ending in September 2005.
In May 2023 at Roscommon Circuit Criminal Court, Judge Kenneth Connolly jailed King, of Warren View, Boyle, Co Roscommon, for five and a half years for 12 counts of sexual assault on the girl who was 16 years old at the time of the offending, while King was in his mid-30s.
King appealed the length of the sentence on grounds of severity and today the Court of Appeal cut his jail term by 15 months.
King had pleaded not guilty to all 12 counts of sexual assault but a jury unanimously convicted him on all charges.
The trial court heard that, over time, King began his assaults by kissing the girl and touching her bottom, then progressing to forcing her to touch his penis, masturbating him to ejaculation, and performing oral sex on the girl.
The injured party, Tara Kelly, who was a babysitter for King’s children, waived her right to anonymity so that King could be publicly named as an abuser.
At the time of the abuse, the Kelly and King families had been close, the sentencing court was told.
The injured party is a cousin of King’s now ex-wife.
At the Court of Appeal last month, Dara Foynes SC, for King, submitted that the sentencing judge erred in his assessment of the gravity of the offending, “with the consequence being that he nominated a headline sentence of 10-and-a-half years that was excessive and disproportionate”.
Foynes submitted that the judge also erred in principle by imposing consecutive sentences in respect of two counts of sexual assault and that the trial judge failed to “have sufficient regard to the mitigation present in the case”.
At the Court of Appeal today, Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy said the court would quash the original sentence and re-sentence King to five years’ imprisonment with the final nine months suspended.
Mr Justice McCarthy said counsel for the appellant had submitted that “there was an error in principle in imposing consecutive sentences”, as there was “merely one victim and that the offending was a continuum … over a limited period”.
The trial judge had identified a pre-mitigation headline sentence of two-and-a-half years on count one with a further headline sentence of eight years identified for count 12, the charge of sexual assault by King in performing oral sex on the girl.
Mr Justice McCarthy said both of the original sentences were to run consecutively with all other charges taken into consideration by the trial judge.
Mr Justice McCarthy said the “imposition of consecutive sentences in this case has given rise to a true headline sentence for all of the offending of some 10-and-a-half years”.
“We think that the trial judge has fallen into error. The headline for count 12, notwithstanding the fact that other counts were taken into consideration, is excessive or disproportionate,” said Mr Justice McCarthy.
Mr Justice McCarthy said the two-and-a-half years identified as a headline sentence for count one running consecutively to count 12s headline sentence of eight years “compounded the error”.
“If the cumulative sentence of 10-and-a-half years is to be regarded as the headline in practice, it is excessive and disproportionate,” said Mr Justice McCarthy, who said the Court of Appeal would quash the original sentence and proceed to re-sentencing King.
“We adopt a different approach to the judge. We think the most straightforward way of proceeding is to sentence on a global basis for all offending on the more serious of the offences, that is count 12, which involved oral sex by the appellant on the victim,” said Mr Justice McCarthy.
Mr Justice McCarthy said the appropriate headline sentence ought to be one of seven years.
Mitigating factors, albeit without “the single most important factor, a guilty plea”, resulted in a reduction to six years.
In applying the “totality principle”, Mr Justice McCarthy further reduced the sentence to five years and then suspended the last nine months for two years.
Mr Justice McCarthy said King’s offending occurred “some 19 to 20 years ago” and he had since led a “pro-social life”.
King was a hard-working man, a loving father and is “to some degree beginning to understand his moral culpability”, said Mr Justice McCarthy.
At the appeal hearing, counsel for the State John Francis Hayden BL submitted the trial judge was correct in law and principle regarding the totality principle and that the judge “duly reflected the overall gravity of the offending, rendering that within his considerable discretion and margin of appreciation”.
Hayden submitted that the judge gave a “detailed and considered” ruling in which he fixed the headline sentences that nominated and weighed up both the aggravating and mitigating factors before reaching the final sentence of five-and-a-half years, which he said was not unduly severe.
Counsel said the judge had recognised the “sheer radius of destruction that occurred in this case”.
Hayden said the last count of sexual assault was “the final act in a pattern of behaviour that had escalated and it reflects the overall gravity of the offending”.
Foynes said the offending “commenced at the lowest end”, that of kissing and of two counts of touching the girl’s bottom outside of her clothing before the behaviour culminated in King performing oral sex on the girl.
The barrister said “consecutive sentences should be used sparingly” and that “in general, consecutive sentences are for when there is more than one victim”.
Foynes said the sentence had been a “departure from the norm based on the facts”.
Counsel said her client was of “very good character prior to the episode and was also so after the commission of the offences”.
Foynes said the complaint relating to the 2005 offences was made 15 years later in 2020 and in 2021 King, who was otherwise a “good person”, was arrested.
In her victim impact statement, Kelly said she had had a very happy and loving childhood but that her life changed forever at 16.
“He made me feel like I wasn’t a good person and that I was responsible for the disgusting things he did to me. I was 16. I was an innocent child, and he took that away from me,” she said.
“When the abuse was happening, I had become so accustomed to the behaviour and learned to just zone out and do what he asked. It was the only way I knew how to cope with what was happening to me,” Kelly said.
“At the time I didn’t have the vocabulary, the knowledge, or the courage to say ‘no’, to say ‘stop’,” she said.
“At 34 years of age, I am still learning that I have a voice, because I have been silent for so long and that my voice matters and that ‘no’ is always an option,” Kelly said.
“I hope that my coming forward and my decision to waive anonymity will encourage other young people to come forward, to not feel shamed into silence and to know you are not alone,” she told the trial.
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