A CLARE woman convicted in July of soliciting an Egyptian poker dealer to kill her partner and his two sons has been sentenced to six years in prison at the Central Criminal Court in Dublin. She is to lodge an appeal.
Sharon Collins, (45) Kildysart Road, Ennis was found guilty of soliciting Essam Eid, an Egyptian with a Las Vegas address, to kill PJ, Robert and Niall Howard in 2006 after an eight-week trial earlier in the year.
She was also found guilty on three counts of conspiring to kill the three men. Her co-accused, 53-year-old Eid, was found guilty of demanding €100,000 from Robert Howard on September 26th, 2006. He was also convicted of handling items stolen from the Howard family business the previous night. During the sentencing hearing yesterday prosecution counsel Tom O'Connell entered a plea of nolle prosequi on three charges of conspiring to kill Mr Howard and his sons on which the jury failed to deliver a verdict.
During the 32-day trial the jury heard Collins had started looking for a hitman on the internet after Mr Howard refused to marry her. Prior to this she obtained a Mexican marriage certificate from a website called proxymarriages.com which she used to obtain an Irish passport in the name Sharon Howard. The jury heard that a large part of the prosecution's case against both Collins and Eid were the extensive series of e-mails found on the hard drives of computers seized from the homes of both Collins and Eid. Collins used the pseudonym "Lying Eyes" in e-mails.
In a witness impact statement Robert and Niall Howard said the incident had caused significant changes in their lives. "We cannot understand how we were propelled from our normal daily lives into such a national drama and shudder at the realisation that had the plan been effected we could have been poisoned to death. We believe it will take a long time, if at all, before we can put the incident behind us." Their father, PJ Howard, pleaded for a non-custodial sentence for Collins.
"Sharon has a very positive outlook on life and she was very loving and giving of her time to our extended families. Sharon always kept an even keel and I have never known her to do anything drastic over those years. She is a very straightforward and honest person and if she wanted anything she would ask."
He asked Mr Justice Roderick Murphy not to impose a custodial sentence "as I do not believe that Sharon poses any threat to my sons. I ask the court to consider how a prison sentence would affect her mother, her two sons and myself." He said Collins had always handled his medication for a heart complaint and he would always trust her to do this. He would have no difficulty moving in to live with her again.
Collins' ex-husband Noel Collins told her defence counsel Paul O'Higgins she had always been a good mother. Mr Justice Murphy also heard character statements on Collins's behalf from the mayor of Ennis, Peter Considine and the Bishop of Killaloo, Bishop Willie Walsh and several family friends.
Brian Glanville, a consultant psychologist said Collins appeared to have a passive detached but dependent personality which could lead to conflict within relationships as she craved security but would feel herself to be stifled. He said when he had visited her on two occasions in prison she had been suffering from anxiety with major signs of depression.
Mr Justice Murphy sentenced Collins to six years for each of the six counts she was convicted on, to all run concurrently. He sentenced Eid to six years in jail for demanding €100,000 from Robert Howard as well as a further year for each of the two charges of handling stolen goods to run concurrently.
After the sentencing, Collins solicitor Eugene O'Kelly said his client took great comfort that her partner Mr Howard had acquitted her.
She had asked him to apologise to Mr Howard for the embarrassment caused by a letter to the Gerry Ryan radio show read out in court which did not reflect her views of Mr Howard and "she regrets the use of that incomplete letter taken out of context. Ms Collins believes that the truth has got obscured some place in the elaborate set up that is cyberspace."