Alan Ward sentenced to life in prison for murder of wife in 2019

A bubbly, happy woman who was a role model and best friend to her children was murdered by her husband in what a judge has described as another in the conveyor belt of “tragic cases which spring from domestic violence.”

Alan Ward stabbed his wife Catherine Doyle to death at their Dublin home in 2019.

Passing the mandatory sentence of life imprisonment for murder on Monday, Mr Justice Tony Hunt called on people who find themselves rising to anger to "step back rather than engage in the kind of behaviour seen in this case".

Detective Sergeant Sean Cosgrove, speaking outside court, urged people in abusive or violent relationships to seek help from gardaí, the courts or other agencies.

He said gardaí are now piloting the use of domestic abuse co-ordinators in west Dublin, where Ms Doyle was murdered.

Ward (54) denied murdering his 41-year-old wife at their home in Greenfort Drive, Clondalkin, Dublin 22 on March 1st, 2019.

His lawyers argued that his responsibility was diminished due to a mental disorder brought on by a stroke he suffered two years earlier.

Following a trial last December a jury rejected the defence arguments having heard that Ward was violent towards his wife for many years prior to the stroke. The jury also convicted Ward of threatening to kill or cause serious harm to his son Adam Ward and of attempting to stab Adam on the same date.

Mr Justice Hunt sentenced Ward to five years and three years respectively for those offences, with each sentence to run concurrently with the life sentence.

The court heard a statement on behalf of Ms Doyle’s family in which she was described as a “kind-hearted, lovely mum, who understood and cared for her sons.”

She was a role model and best friend to them but was taken away from them by their father. Outside court the family also thanked gardaí and their community for supporting them, saying: “It is a great feeling knowing our mother was loved by so many people.”

Giollaíosa Ó Lideadha SC, for Ward, read to the court a letter from his client in which Ward said he was “full of shame” for what he had done and added: “I find it hard to look at my sons because of the shame.”

The court also heard that Ward had two previous convictions for road traffic matters and one for an offence under the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act.

Mr Justice Hunt described the killing as “terribly sad and tragic” and said the violence used by Ward was “quite extreme”.

He described Ms Doyle’s sons as “young men of extraordinary courage and dignity”.

During the trial, Adam Ward, told the jury that he emerged from his room after hearing a bang and saw his father in the doorway of his parents’ bedroom striking downwards.

When Adam asked what he was doing, his father told him, “get the f**k away from me or I’m going to kill you,” swiped at him with the blade and lunged towards him.

Adam stepped backwards, out of the way of the knife, and ran downstairs. When he saw his father following he quickly unlocked the front door and ran across the street to where he saw a small group of people. He told them what had happened and one of them called the Garda.

The trial also heard that Ward was convicted in 2000 of assaulting his wife causing her harm and gardaí were called to their home to respond to domestic disputes five times over the years.

When he lived in Tallaght, Ward got into a fight with a neighbour and stabbed him in the neck with a Samurai sword. Gardaí were called to that incident but Ward’s neighbour decided not to make a complaint, the trial heard. Soon afterwards, the Ward family was forced to leave Tallaght after their windows were smashed and acid was poured on their car.

Adam Ward told the jury that he stopped speaking to his father after the incident with the Samurai sword. His parents, he said, often argued and there were always “problems and fights” between them. When the arguments became physical it was usually “pushing and dragging,” he said, but “there were times Alan would punch my mother.”

He said both his parents drank and described his mother as a “happy drunk” who would want to dance and have a laugh. His father, he said, was “sloppy” when he drank and would “get sick, fall over, just go too far.” He remembered his mother leaving the family home 15 to 20 times following arguments over the years but she would always come back. By March 2019 his father was sleeping in the sitting room and his mother slept in an upstairs bedroom.

In 2017, he said his father had a stroke which affected his speech and required him to attend classes to learn how to talk. Adam said his father’s personality didn’t change following the stroke; the only difference he noticed was the difficulty his father had with his speech.