Catherine Nevin to be considered for day release

CONVICTED MURDERER Catherine Nevin is expected to be given temporary release from prison in the coming weeks.

The Parole Board has made a recommendation that Nevin (61), who was convicted of the murder of her husband Tom Nevin, should be considered for day release to undertake a course outside the Dóchas Centre, the women’s prison where she is serving her sentence.

Nevin received a mandatory life sentence in 2000 for the murder of her husband on March 19th, 1996, at Jack White’s Inn in Wicklow, the pub the couple jointly owned.

The case was one of the most publicised in the history of the State.

The court was told Nevin had hired a hit man to kill her husband and had then attempted to blacken his name by suggesting he was involved in the IRA.

After a trial lasting 61 days, with five days of deliberation by the jury, then a record, Nevin was found guilty of murder.

She was also convicted of soliciting three men – Gerard Heapes, John Jones and William McClean – to kill her husband.

At her trial, Nevin claimed to have been robbed at gunpoint by the same raiders who killed her husband. She has unsuccessfully appealed her sentence on two occasions.

She is also in the middle of a legal dispute over her claimed entitlement to her late husband’s assets.

The Parole Board has made a recommendation that Nevin be allowed out of prison to attend a suitable training course that might assist in her rehabilitation and reintegration into society when she eventually leaves.

An Irish Prison Service spokesman said the service did not comment on individual cases, but a prison source said the notion Nevin would leave prison in a couple of weeks was “not correct”.

Instead she will be allowed to leave the prison once a week or once a fortnight, returning the same day.

The course will be part of the Irish Prison Service’s attempts to put together a pre-release plan for Nevin. The Parole Board will consider her application for release in June 2013.

They will make a recommendation to the Minister for Justice, who will make the ultimate decision as to whether she should be released from jail.