The son of veteran criminal Eamon Kelly has been jailed for 10 years for trying to murder his former wife’s friend, who he blamed for the break-up of his marriage, in a knife attack at the victim’s home.
In sentencing Matthias Kelly (43) at the Central Criminal Court on Wednesday, Judge Paul McDermott noted that the “ferocious attack” on Fiona Timmermans had left the victim with facial scarring and robbed her of her sense of safety.
The judge said that it was not clear that a brain injury suffered by Kelly following a road traffic accident in 2016 had affected his actions on the day, but he ruled that such an injury would make the defendant’s time in prison more difficult.
Kelly, of no fixed abode in Coolock in Dublin, pleaded guilty last year to the attempted murder of Fiona Timmermans at Newbury Lawns, Clonshaugh in Dublin 17 on September 7th, 2024.
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At a sentencing hearing in January, Det Gda Alan Roche told prosecution counsel Brendan Grehan that the victim was a friend of the defendant’s former wife.
On September 1st, 2024, he sent a text to her saying: “I’m going to cut your throat, you’re dead.” On September 6th, he threw a brick through the window of his ex-wife’s home.
The following day he entered his victim’s home through an open back door, took a knife from her kitchen and went to her bedroom. Timmermans described to gardaí that she awoke to see Kelly standing over her before he started stabbing at her neck and head “like a madman”, and shouting: “You’re dead, you’re dead.”
She fought back and kicked him in the groin before he “jumped on her head five times” and left the house, the garda said. Timmermans told gardaí she knew she had a bad wound to her neck, saw blood everywhere and thought she was going to die.
She was treated at Beaumont Hospital for stab wounds to her forehead, face and neck but was discharged on the same day. A doctor’s report stated that she may be left with permanent, visible scars.
When gardaí arrested and questioned him, Kelly described his victim as a “knacker” and said she had “ruined my family’s life”. He said he would still be with his wife if it were not for her but said he regretted attacking her, describing his actions as “bang out of order” and “disgusting”.
“I never really planned on doing it. I never thought I would actually go through with it,” he said.
Barristers for Kelly said he had suffered a brain injury in 2016 following a car crash and a further head injury in a fall down a stairs two days before he broke into his victim’s home and tried to stab her to death.
The judge noted the defendant was reluctant to accept that he entered the house in an attempt to kill the victim, but he accepted that he had narrowly avoided killing her.
“It is not clear that his brain injury had an effect on what he did,” McDermott said, adding that self-induced intoxication was not an excuse nor a mitigating factor. He accepted, however, that Kelly’s wife said violence was out of character for her husband.
Justice McDermott set headline sentences of 16 years for the attempted murder, 10 years for burglary, eight years for making threats to kill, and four years each for the production of an article and a criminal damage charge.
He said there were significant mitigating factors in the case, including Kelly’s guilty plea, his expression of remorse, and the fact he had taken steps to address his violence and addiction issues.
He said that Kelly’s “rage and anger” led him to commit these offences, but he had no prior convictions for violent offences. The judge also said that prison would be more difficult for Kelly due to his acquired brain injury.
After mitigation, Justice McDermott imposed a sentence 12 years for the attempted murder, seven years for burglary, six years for the threats to kill, and three years each for the production of the knife and criminal damage, with all sentences to run concurrently, backdated to September 9th, 2024.
Kelly’s father, Eamon Kelly, was shot dead outside his home on Furry Park Road, Killester, Dublin 5, on December 4th, 2012.
