A JUDGE at the Central Criminal Court said yesterday that he agreed with the Director of Public Prosecutions that the stabbing of a young man was at the higher end of the manslaughter scale and he imposed a 10-year jail sentence.
However, after the case the family of the 21-year-old man stabbed to death in Waterford city over two years ago, criticised the sentence and said it was not long enough.
Robert Devine, from Wheatfields in Clonmel, Co Tipperary, was jailed for the manslaughter of Joseph Cummins.
The deceased was stabbed in the leg and fatally in the chest on November 24th, 2007, after he spent the night drinking with his older brother and Devine, at the accused’s rented house in Lower Grange, Waterford city. Devine (33), who has over 70 previous convictions, was originally charged with Mr Cummins’s murder, but pleaded guilty to manslaughter before the trial was due to start last December.
Commenting yesterday on the increase in knife crime and stabbing fatalities in recent years, Mr Justice Barry White said he was “strongly of the view that deterrent sentences are necessary in the hope that they reduce the occurrence of stabbings”.
However, the judge said “sufficient of my colleagues do not share my view.”
“Life in certain areas seems to have become very cheap, if not reduced to the level where there is no value placed on life,” he said, handing down the 10-year sentence.
Giving his reaction after the court hearing, Mr Cummins’s father said “10 years is not enough for knife crime.
“There’s new families here every week. Every week there will be someone here in my place . . . the sentences are just not enough.”
Holding a framed photograph of Joseph wearing a tuxedo, Mr Cummins described his son as a quiet, industrious young man who always worked hard.
“He didn’t deserve to die like that” he added.
“It’s us that’s serving the life sentence,” Joseph’s sister Dawn added.
Giving evidence at the sentencing hearing, Det Sgt Anthony Pettit said Devine had left his home in Clonmel and rented a house in Waterford because he wanted a fresh start, away from his former associates.
The court heard he had 72 previous convictions, including several convictions for assault and one for possession of a knife.
Det Sgt Pettit said the three men spent the evening of Friday, November 23rd, 2007, drinking and taking cocaine at Devine’s house.
The accused told gardaí that he wanted to clear the house the following afternoon and was trying to get Joseph Cummins to leave, but that he refused.
Devine said he went to the kitchen to get a knife to show Mr Cummins that he was serious, he said Joseph kicked out at him, and he stabbed him in the leg.
He said they had another confrontation in the kitchen and that was when the deceased received the fatal stab wound to his chest.
Det Sgt Pettit said it appeared that Devine washed the knife and threw it into an overgrown part of the back garden, before calling for an ambulance.
The ambulance crew tried to resuscitate Mr Cummins at the scene but he died shortly afterward in Waterford Regional Hospital.
In their victim impact statement, the Cummins family said they had been buying Christmas presents for Joseph on November 24th, when they got the news that he was dead.
They said the next day they were buying a coffin and a grave for their son and it was the worst feeling in the world.
“God only knows how far he would have gone in life, we will never know.”
In handing down the sentence, Mr Justice White said he was taking into consideration the accused’s “11th-hour” plea of guilty of manslaughter, before the murder trial started.
He said he was also giving consideration to the remorse Devine had shown, although he thought that remorse was not apparent until the trial had been due to begin.
He backdated the 10-year sentence to January 2009.