Teen fails in appeal bid over pub assault

A teenager whose mother, father, and brother all took their lives at different times in the family home failed in his appeal yesterday against a conviction for assaulting a man in a pub.

Keith Greaney, of 45 Dunard, Lotabeg, Mayfield, Cork, was convicted of assault causing harm to Craig McNamara at the Fob and Gill pub at Mayfield Shopping Centre, Cork, on December 11, 2014.

At Cork District Court, Greaney, aged 19, got a nine-month jail term for the attack. He appealed the conviction and sentence at Cork Circuit Appeals Court yesterday. Judge Donagh McDonagh affirmed the conviction. However he said he would increase the sentence to one year and suspend it on condition that the accused would keep the peace for the next four years.

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“The offence is proven. It was scandalous, outrageous and utterly inappropriate behaviour. He behaved in an absolutely savage manner,” Judge McDonagh said.

The judge said he had to take account of the tragic family circumstances. Greaney’s barrister, Alan O’Dwyer, said the young man was trying to deal with the traumatic experience of the past few years when his mother, father, and brother all took their own lives in the family home where the defendant still lives.

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