Hi °C | Lo °C Serious questions about why a killer teenager was released have been raised after he carried out “a gratuitous attack” while on licence.
Eamon Coyle strangled and stabbed his 78-year-old grandfather Francis O'Neill in 2009 when he was just 16-years-old.
He was initially sentenced to 12 months detention with two years on licence after he pleaded guilty to manslaughter.
This prompted a furore of criticism over the apparent leniency of the sentence.
Coyle’s sentence was later doubled to two years’ detention and two years on licence in December 2010 after the intervention of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
This week Coyle (19) was convicted of attacking a man outside an Omagh bar on February 12 while out on licence.
The teenager, who appeared in Omagh Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday, was fuelled by drugs and alcohol during the incident outside a bar in Campsie.
The victim was left with two black eyes and bite marks.
Coyle pleaded guilty to a series of charges including assaulting a male, resisting police and criminally damaging a police vehicle outside licensed premises, but will not serve any additional time in detention.
He was returned to Hydebank Young Offenders Centre to serve the remaining 17 months of his manslaughter sentence.
District Judge Bernie Kelly said the context of Coyle’s record made the charges all the more serious.
“One would have thought having been released, remorse would have led to a life of piety. That is certainly not the case,” she said.
The judge imposed a three-month sentence for each charge to be served concurrently with Coyle’s manslaughter sentence.
This means he is still due for release late next year.
Chairman of the Stormont Justice Committee Paul Givan said this case raises “questions that need to be asked”.
“Obviously the initial sentence that he got for manslaughter has failed to act as a deterrent,” he said.
“And the fact that this offence was committed while he was on licence would demonstrate that the public have not been protected either by the criminal justice system from this individual,” he said.
Mr Givan added: “There needs to be a review as to how these individuals are managed when they are on licence and whenever somebody has a clear record — a criminal record — of these types of attacks you need to have an estimating sentence regime put in place that will act as a proper deterrent.”
Background
Eamon Coyle, from Drumleaghagh Road South, Drumquin, was just 16 when he killed his grandfather Francis O’Neill (right) in April 2009 during a botched robbery. The attack was carried out at the 78-year-old’s Brook Valley home to get £80 to pay Coyle's rent. Outrage was voiced after he was originally sentenced to 12 months for manslaughter in 2010. After the intervention of the Director of Public Prosecutions it was ruled by the Court of Appeal the sentence was lenient and the jail sentence was doubled.
