Convicted rapist sent back to prison following robbery conviction
A convicted rapist who was released from jail in January 2014 has been imprisoned again after he committed a further crime while on a ten year suspended sentence.
Niall Healy (42) of no fixed abode, was sentenced to 20 years in prison with the final 10 years suspended in October 2006 after he was convicted by a Central Criminal Court jury of the aggravated sexual assault and false imprisonment of a woman in July 2001.
At the time he had a previous conviction for rape for which he received a 12-year sentence in June 1993. The final six years of this sentence was suspended, so at the time of the aggravated sexual assault, Healy was still under a good behaviour bond.
In October 2006, sentencing judge Mr Justice Barry White said he was concerned having learned of Healy's previous rape conviction that it was necessary to effectively “put him in prison and throw away the key” but said this would only represent “society's revenge” and would serve nobody.
Reports before the court at the time assessed Healy as being at medium to high risk of re-offending but there was garda evidence that there had been “a substantial change” in his life since 2001.
Mr Justice White said in 2006 that he believed the risk could be reduced if Healy was placed under a strict regime before he suspended the final 10 years of the 20-year sentence.
Earlier this week Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy heard evidence that following his release in January 2014 from that sentence Healy was jailed for two years for robbery.
The court heard Healy was again released in January 2018 and had since relapsed into drug use, attacked a woman's car stopped at traffic lights and broken into an unoccupied house.
Today, Mr Justice McCarthy re-activated six years of the ten year suspended term and backdated those six years to June 2015. He suspended the remaining four years on strict conditions.
Referring to Mr Justice White's sentencing of Healy he said it was “a classic example of the court trying to facilitate rehabilitation” but said the man had quickly relapsed into drug abuse after he had “no stable environment to live”.
“He has broken the faith of the courts and has failed to fulfil the obligations that were put on him,” the judge said after commenting that “court orders must be obeyed”.
“I am conscious that ultimately the community will be at a lesser risk if this man is reformed,” Mr Justice McCarthy said before he added that it was “for the protection of the community” that he was leaving Healy under a suspended term upon his release from prison.
He ordered that Healy must undergo drug treatment, anger management, educational and other courses that may be prescribed by the Probation Services in Ireland or the UK.
“Society must be protected. A person must be imprisoned if he commits further crime but also it is in the public's interest that someone be reformed."
"One must try and put in place a regime that on his release from prison he not be a danger to society,” Mr Justice McCarthy said.
He said he had also taken into account evidence which suggested that Healy is a changed man.
