A 41-year-old man who admitted killing his second cousin has been jailed for two years at the Circuit Criminal Court in Cork.
The Court heard that James O'Driscoll from Skibbereen, Co Cork, had spent St Stephen's Day 2005 drinking and watching trotting races with his cousin and friend Philip O'Driscoll.
The two apparently began fighting and James O'Driscoll punched his cousin several times before Philip O'Driscoll fell and hit his head. He suffered a fractured skull.
In sentencing, Judge Sean O Donabhain noted that James O'Driscoll had 60 previous convictions. Five of these were for assault and alcohol had been a common factor in many of these.
He said O'Driscoll's addiction to alcohol had remained unabated and hadn't been attended to.
Despite O'Driscoll's guilty plea and his co-operation with investigating Gardaí, Judge O Donabhain said he couldn't deal with the case in a non-custodial way and he jailed him for two years.
The sentence will be back-dated to October 2006, when O'Driscoll was first taken into custody.
