Covid denier who threatened to chop up his wife jailed for coercive control of his family

The court heard Harkin believed in several conspiracy theories and his coercive control of his wife and two children escalated in the run-up to their impending return to school last September

49-year-old Paul Harkin continued to dispute and contest some of the allegations made against him.

A man whose young children fear for their mother’s safety once he is released from custody has been sentenced to three years in prison for using coercion to control his family.

Imposing the sentence at Galway Circuit Criminal Court this week, Judge Rory McCabe concurred with the findings of psychiatric and probation reports handed into court, that 49-year-old Paul Harkin posed a high risk of re-offending and of committing violence against his partner.