Convicted killer and rapist jailed again for brutal assault with a hammer

The man who was convicted of raping and killing beautician Rachel Kiely has been jailed again for a brutal assault with a hammer.

Ian Horgan (39), was convicted of raping and strangling the 22-year old beautician in Cork in 2000. Horgan was 16 years of age when he killed Ms Kiely when she was walking her dogs in a park near to her home. He was released from prison in 2021.

Horgan pleaded guilty on Tuesday to assault causing serious harm to Hassan Baker (29) and assault causing harm to his mother Mary O’Callaghan (66) following the hammer attack in their home on March 26th 2022.

Det Supt Mick Comyns told Cork Circuit Criminal Court how Horgan had travelled from his home at the Hermitage in Macroom to Cork by bus on the afternoon in question with a bag containing a hammer and a change of clothes and shoes.

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He went to a derelict shed on waste ground near Ms O’Callaghan’s home on MacCurtain Villas and changed into a black hoodie and snood before arriving at the house. He barged past Ms O’Callaghan when she answered the door and began hitting Mr Baker with the hammer.

He also grabbed Mr Baker in an arm lock and when Mr Baker fell to the floor, he began raining hammer blows down on his head, fracturing his skull and his left cheekbone, all the time trying to disguise himself by speaking with a Dublin accent and talking about collecting a debt.

Ms O’Callaghan, who suffered a fractured wrist trying to save her son, told in a victim impact statement how she continues to experience flashbacks of the incident and she still sees the imprint of what Horgan did to her son on the side of his skull even though she knows he is lucky to be alive.

“I felt so helpless. It was like being part of a horror movie but unfortunately it was real. He kept on pounding Hassan’s head with the hammer. At this stage Hassan was unconscious and I thought he was dead. I managed to get in between them, and I shouted that he is dead,” she said.

“After I said to him that Hassan was dead, he then left. I really felt my son, Hassan was dead as the place was like a bloodbath. The next thing I remember was being in the hospital and the doctors were explaining about the brain surgery that they were going to perform on my son.”

Before Horgan left, he filmed both Mr Baker and his mother on his phone which was later recovered by gardaí and Judge Boyle was shown the footage which showed Mr Baker, his face covered in blood before he is filmed lying crumpled and seemingly lifeless on the floor.

Det Supt Comyns said that gardaí opened an investigation and found both Horgan’s clothing and the hammer at the derelict shed after he changed clothes and a forensic examination found traces of both Mr Baker’s blood and Ms O’Callaghan’s blood on Horgan’s clothing.

Horgan went to Fitzgerald Park where, over photos of the pond dubbed to the sound of ‘Lovely Day’ he sent messages to his then girlfriend, Clarisse O’Callaghan, who had previously gone out with Mr Baker, in which he boasted he “destroyed him” and “he won’t be acting the hard man ever again.”

Mr Baker told in his Victim Impact Statement how he had never even spoke to Horgan prior to that day but that the assault has left him “devastated, scared and in a paranoid state, looking out the window and over my shoulder every single day” as he recalled what exactly happened to him.

“I was knocked to the ground with the impact and the blood flowed massively from my head, I had tried to protect my mother while I struggled to defend myself, but I was helpless. The blows of the hammer knocked me out completely. It was a nightmare scene. I then became unconscious.”

Mr Baker said that his life had changed dramatically as a result of the assault, and he had suffered three seizures since it happened while he now suffers from migraines and his speech has also been “affected majorly” as he now speaks with a stammer.

“I worry about the long-term effects that this will have on me as my short-term memory has not been the same since. I get very frustrated with this, and my mother is constantly worrying about me and does not want to let me out of her sight,” he said.

Det Supt Comyns said that Horgan did not answer any questions when he was arrested and interviewed by gardaí about the assault.

He also confirmed that Horgan, who had a drug addiction at the time, had a total of 17 previous convictions and in addition to those for the rape and manslaughter of Rachel Kiely in 2000 when he was 16, he also had previous convictions for robbery, affray, drug dealing and car theft.

Judge Helen Boyle described the attack by Horgan on Mr Baker and his mother as “cowardly” and said it merited a headline sentence of twelve years but reduced it to one of nine years in light of Horgan’s guilty plea while she suspended the final six months of the sentence.

Judge Boyle said there were several notable aggravating factors in the case including the premeditated nature of the attack where he travelled from Macroom with a change of clothes and a hammer, the actual violence of the attack and the fact that he filmed it and shared the film online.

Prosecution barrister, Donal O’Sullivan BL said the DPP was of the view that the assault was at the higher end of the scale of assault causing serious harm offences suggesting it merited a sentence of ten to 15 years and Judge Boyle said she shared the DPP’s view on the seriousness of the offence.

She noted that Horgan had pleaded guilty and spared the state the expense of a trial that would have involved 130 witnesses while his plea had also spared his victims having to testify and Ms O’Callaghan had spoken in her Victim Impact Statement of her relief that he had pleaded guilty.

“It would be hard to disagree with Ms O’Callaghan’s description of the assault as being like a horror movie after seeing the video,” said Judge Boyle, who noted that Horgan had written letters of apology and expressed remorse to his victims before she jailed him for eight and a half years.