AN APPEAL AGAINST the undue leniency of a six-month prison sentence handed down to a man convicted of sexual assault will be heard today.
Anthony Lyons an aviation broker, had five-and-a-half years of a six-year sentence suspended last year, after being found guilty of sexually assaulting a woman near Griffith Avenue on Dublin’s northside in 2010.
He was also ordered to pay the 27-year-old victim €75,000 in compensation.
In November, the Director of Public Prosecutions was successful in its appeal against the leniency of the sentence but a decision on what sentence should instead be imposed was reserved.
But in the interim Mr Justice Michael Hanna became seriously ill and as a result the appeal has had to be re-heard.
Lyons admitted to the attack but had argued that a combination medication and alcohol caused him to carry out the attack.
The Court of Criminal Appeal had ruled that the sentence imposed was too lenient, citing an “error in principle”.
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