Mandatory life terms for murder upheld

CLAIMS by convicted murderers Peter Whelan and Paul Lynch that the mandatory life term for murder breaches their rights under the Constitution and European Convention on Human Rights were unanimously dismissed by the Supreme Court yesterday.

Murder is the “ultimate crime against society as a whole” and the state is entitled to impose a punishment at “the highest level which the law permits,” the Chief Justice, Mr Justice John Murray, said.

As a person convicted of murder had to be proven to have intended to kill or cause serious injury, it could be “properly differentiated from all other crimes,” including manslaughter.