DPP to appeal O'Donoghue's sentence

RTÉ News has learned that the Director of Public Prosecutions is to appeal the four-year jail sentence imposed on Wayne O'Donoghue last month for the killing of his 11-year old neighbour Robert Holohan.

Appeal papers have been lodged with the Court of Criminal Appeal.

It is thought the appeal could be heard within six months.

Robert Holohan's body was found on 12 January last year. It was discovered near Inch Strand in east Cork, nearly 20km from his home in Ballyedmond.

O'Donoghue was sentenced to four years in jail after a ten-day trial. He had earlier been acquitted of Robert Holohan's murder.

After the sentence was handed down, O'Donoghue's solicitor, Frank Buttimer, said his client was relieved that the trial was over.

He said he accepted that the sentence handed down by Mr Justice Paul Carney was balanced and fair.

However, the sentence angered Robert Holohan's family, particularly after his mother, Majella Holohan, had revealed in her victim impact statement that semen had been discovered on her son's body during the post mortem examination.

The prosecution had been aware of this during the trial, but the jury was not told about it because it could not be definitively established whose semen it was.

Mr Buttimer emphatically denied that there was any sexual motive for the killing.

Majella Holohan wrote to the DPP requesting an appeal but sources close to the case felt that that was unlikely; and it appeared that that would be the case, with the time for lodging an appeal due to run out at the close of business this evening.

However, just after 3pm today staff from the DPP's office lodged an appeal asking the Court of Criminal Appeal to review the four-year sentence.