The Court of Criminal Appeal (CCA) has reduced from 20 to 16 years a prison sentence imposed on a man for having some £41 million of cocaine for supply.
Dublin-born John O'Toole, (55), who had been living in Panama City, was jailed in June 1999 for having the cocaine for supply in Kinsale, Co Cork, in September 1998. A second man, Michael Tune, (42), from England, is serving a 12 year sentence in connection with the same offence.
O'Toole and Tune had brought 325 kilos of the drug from Panama to Kinsale on board O'Toole's boat, the Gemeos.
A three-week trial at Cork Circuit Criminal Court in June 1999 heard that officers from the Customs and Excise national drugs unit uncovered the cocaine hidden under bunks, diesel tanks and behind a bulwark of the 50-foot catamaran.
Analysis showed it was 75 per cent pure cocaine, giving it an estimated street value of £41.5 million. Gardaí believed the drug was ultimately destined for Britain and Europe, with only a fraction for Ireland.
The three-judge CCA yesterday turned down an application by O'Toole for leave to appeal against his conviction. However, it decided that his 20 year sentence should be reduced to 16 years, backdated to the date of his arrest.
O'Toole's counsel had submitted there were a number of mitigating factors. They included his co-operation with gardaí, that he had no previous convictions, that his wife had died four days before his trial, that he had been in prison for her funeral and that he had been in custody since September 1998.
In its reserved judgment yesterday, the Court of Criminal Appeal said it was satisfied the trial judge, when determining sentence, had erred in dismissing, without due consideration, the factor of duress. It said that O'Toole was now a widower and had two children in Panama.
Ms Justice Denham, presiding, said the court was also mindful that the sentence should be proportionate to the crime and proportionate both to O'Toole and his co-defendant.