A Carlow father and son have been sentenced for assaulting three people while the son’s still born child was being waked at their home.
Michael Slater Senior (61) and Michael Slater Junior (36) assaulted the mother of the child, Slater Jnr’s partner, who had given birth to the baby the previous day.
They also assaulted her sister and her sister’s partner. The victims were attacked with a wooden axe handle and a floor board. They were all later treated in hospital for various facial injuries.
Slater Jnr, who was described in court by Judge Eugene O’Kelly as “a man with propensity to violence” broke the same victim’s jaw three months later, when his partner was three months pregnant. The woman later required surgery to insert a plate and braces to fix her jaw.
Both Slaters of Heatherhill Square, Graiguecullen , Carlow pleaded guilty at Carlow Circuit Criminal Court to three charges of assault causing harm to the three victims at Heatherhill Square on August 28, 2024.
Slater Jnr further pleaded guilty to production of a wooden bat and issuing threats to both his partner and her sister. He also pleaded guilty to assault causing harm to his partner on October 21, 2024.
There were no victim impact statements before the court.
Slater Jnr who has previous convictions for offences including assault causing harm and assault causing serious harm was on bail for the first offence when he carried out the second attack. He had initially been granted High Court bail but that bail was revoked when he committed the second assault.
His father has a previous conviction for a sexual assault from 2010. He received a six month suspended sentence for that assault. He has not come to garda attention since and has abided by his High Court bail conditions.
Judge O’Kelly said it was “absolutely shocking” that Slater Snr had assaulted a grieving mother and her family during the wake of his own grandchild. He referred to photographs he had been shown of the victims’ injuries and described it as a serious assault.
He said it was “a night of heightened emotion” and said that the mother of the child was in her home “at a time when she should have received support and not violence”.
Judge O’Kelly set a headline sentence of four years before he reduced this to a three year term having taken into account Slater Snr’s pleas of guilty and troubled background. That three year sentence was suspended in full on strict conditions.
Judge O’Kelly said the case of Slater Jnr was “an entirely different situation”.
He said the man had attacked his partner and her family “the night his still-born child was being waked”.
He said it was a violent assault and a weapon was used before he described Slater Jnr as “a man with a propensity for violence”.
Judge O’Kelly said it was an aggravating feature that the assault was carried out in the context of an intimate partner relationship.
“This man’s life is marked by violent tendencies,” Judge O’Kelly said before he set headline sentences of six and five years for the assault offences.
He imposed a sentence of four and half years and a concurrent term of three years and nine months having taken his guilty plea and “a chaotic dysfunctional and violent childhood” into account.
Judge O’Kelly said the woman was badly beaten in the second assault and referred to the surgery she required.
He said this offence warranted a headline sentence of eight years which he reduced to six years having taken into account the mitigating factors including his plea of guilty.
Judge O’Kelly said the sentences must be consecutive to each other, leading to a sentence of ten and half years.
He suspended the final four years of the term on strict conditions including that Slater Jnr engage with the Probation Service for three years. The sentence was backdated to when Slater Jnr was first remanded in custody last November.
ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE
Sergeant Ronan Bishop told Miranda Egan-Langley BL prosecuting that gardaí were alerted to a domestic incident in August 2024. When they arrived they could hear male voices telling the gardaí to “f**k off”.
Gardaí forced entry and found Slater Snr and Jnr downstairs. They were arrested. The three victims were upstairs. All three had facial cuts and were bleeding.
His partner was later treated for a cut above her left eye, while the man had a wound to his cheek and a cut above his eye. Her sister had a suspected broken nose.
The men were questioned but that questioning was suspended due to their level of intoxication. They were later interviewed but no admissions were made.
Sgt Bishop accepted that everyone in the house had “consumed intoxicants” but he added that all the victims and the two accused “were capable of holding conversations”.
The court heard that the following October Slater Jnr’s partner was again assaulted by him. He punched her to the head and when she tried to get to a window to call for help, he pulled her back by the hair and continued to punch her to the face.
She later required surgery to treat a broken jaw. Photographs of her injuries were handed into court. There was no victim impact statement in the case.
Slater Jnr was arrested but made no admission during garda interview.
Tom Kelly BL defending Slater Jnr acknowledged that there were a number of aggravating features in the case.
He said his client instructs that he was not aware that his partner was pregnant during the second assault but the prosecuting garda returned to the stand and gave evidence that he was aware of the pregnancy.
She said she didn’t accept his claim that he didn’t know his partner was pregnant with his child.
Mr Kelly said a report from the Probation Service indicated that Slater Jnr told officers that his behaviour on the night of his son’s wake was “horrific and distasteful”.
He said he hopes to build a relationship with his daughter in the future, the child his partner was pregnant with at the time of the second assault.
Counsel said “intoxication” was at the root of all his client’s offending behaviour but he said Slater Jnr is “now willing to engage to address his addiction, anger and violent behaviour”.
He said his client has made significant progress since his remand in prison and feels he has reached “a turning point in his life”. He asked the court to structure his client’s sentence to facilitate his continued treatment for his addiction on his ultimate release from prison.
David Roberts BL defending Slater Snr, said his client, a retired plumbing contractor, is recently married.
He said his first marriage was an unhappy one and his wife left him to rear their children alone.
Mr Roberts said Slater Snr’s son was murdered in Carlow in 2001 and this has had a massive impact on his client.
He said Slater Snr was “extremely remorseful” and said “emotions were heightened” in a night that was very sad and tragic.
Mr Roberts said his client spent a month in prison awaiting his High Court bail and that this was “a very sharp lesson for him”. He said his client had a number of medical conditions and it was “a most regrettable offence”.