An attempt by Dubliner Linda Mulhall to have her 15-year sentence reduced for the manslaughter of her mother's boyfriend, whose body was cut up and dumped, will be heard before the end of the year.
The three judge Court of Criminal Appeal will hear mother of four Linda Mulhall's appeal against sentence on December 20th next but judgment may not be delivered until the new year.
It is expected lawyers for Mulhall will argue, among other matters, that given her troubled background, the fact she had contacted gardaí about the crime and that the jury had accepted her defence of provocation, the sentence imposed by Mr Justice Paul Carney last December was excessive.
A hearing date for the appeal by Mulhall's younger sister Charlotte, who was convicted of the murder of Sheilila Salim, also known as Farah Swaleh Noor, has yet to be fixed.
Charlotte Mulhall (24), of Kilclare Heights, Tallaght, is appealing against both her conviction and life sentence but the appeal of her 31-year-old sister, who has the same address, is confined to the severity of her sentence.
The sisters were found guilty of killing Farah Swaleh Noor on March 20th, 2005, after a drinking session at the home of their mother, Kathleen Mulhall, in Summerhill, Dublin.
They chopped up the 38-year-old African man's body, before dumping his headless remains in the Royal Canal at Ballybough in the north inner city. Parts of the victim have never been found.
When sentencing the women at the Central Criminal Court, Mr Justice Carney said the case involved the most grotesque of killings.
The jury took four days to reach its verdict.
The trial was told that, on the day of the killing, the sisters, their mother and Mr Noor had been drinking heavily in the city centre.
Linda Mulhall told gardaí that, back in their mother's flat, the women took ecstasy with Mrs Mulhall crushing a tablet into the victim's drink so they were all on the same "buzz".
It was alleged Mr Noor made a pass at Linda and that, telling him to get his hands off her sister, Charlotte picked up a Stanley blade and cut his throat.
Linda admitted hitting the victim a lot of times over the head with a hammer.
The trial was told the sisters dragged his body into the bathroom of her mother's home and cut it up with a bread knife and hammer.
Mr Noor's torso and limbs were seen in the canal 10 days later.
The severed head was taken in a separate bag on the bus to Tallaght where it was buried and reburied in a number of locations. It has never been recovered.
The victim, who arrived in Ireland in December 1996 claiming to be a Somalian called Sheilila Salim, was granted citizenship in March 1999 after he became the father of an Irish-born child.
Gardaí located his last address to Mrs Mulhall's home at Richmond Cottages, Ballybough.
At the close of the trial, in submissions on sentence, Linda Mulhall's lawyers argued that her contacts with gardaí were paramount in solving the crime. The judge was asked to impose only a minimal sentence so she could care for her four children, who are all still at school.
After the killing, the judge was told Linda turned to drugs and alcohol, had slashed her arms, and spent more than a week in a psychiatric hospital before the trial.
Both sisters also had a history of drug and alcohol abuse.
