Not the first time rulings have caused controversy

Mr Justice Paul Carney may have been in confident form when he wrote the following in his contribution to a collection of essays titled Criminal Justice in Ireland back in 2002: “People have been murdering and raping each other from time immemorial and, accordingly, the law in relation to these crimes is well settled.

They are the easiest and most unchallenging cases to try.”

Maybe that is the case for the man who has presided over more rape and murder cases than any of his peers, but his 10 years in the Central Criminal Court before he made those comments and the decade he has been there since have proved they are certainly not the easiest cases to sentence.