{"id":55953,"date":"2025-09-10T21:10:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-10T21:10:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/55953\/"},"modified":"2025-09-10T21:10:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-10T21:10:07","slug":"carjackers-who-terrorised-several-motorists-have-sentences-lengthened-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/55953\/","title":{"rendered":"Carjackers who \u2018terrorised\u2019 several motorists have sentences lengthened \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two men who \u201cterrorised\u201d other motorists during a hijacking spree across parts of Northern Ireland<\/a> are to have their jail sentences more than doubled, the Court of Appeal ruled on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Declan Anthony Collins (36) and Sean Mateer (37) went on a drunken rampage between Newcastle and Belfast<\/a>, ramming several cars and attacking elderly victims.<\/p>\n

Senior judges held that the prison terms originally imposed on the pair were unduly lenient.<\/p>\n

Chief Justice Dame Siobhan Keegan said: \u201cThey terrorised a range of people going about their daily business.\u201d<\/p>\n

Collins, from Graham Gardens in Lisburn, had his sentence increased from four to nine years.<\/p>\n

Mateer, of Helen Street in Crumlin, was told he must now serve eight years instead of three years and two months.<\/p>\n

Both men pleaded guilty to involvement in a series of hijackings and attempted hijackings on June 1st, 2019.<\/p>\n

Collins also admitted driving dangerously and being behind the wheel while disqualified.<\/p>\n

The crime spree began when the defendants left a caravan park in Newcastle, Co Down, in a Volkswagen Golf.<\/p>\n

A short time later they abandoned the car and approached an 85-year-old man in a bid to get him to hand over his Peugeot. The pensioner was punched in the face and dragged from his car by the hijackers.<\/p>\n

Later, a 71-year old American tourist was attacked during a failed attempt to seize his Skoda.<\/p>\n

At around noon in the Carryduff area, a female driver was targeted after the stolen Peugeot rammed into her car. She got out, thinking it had been an accident, but was thrown to the ground before her vehicle was taken.<\/p>\n

During further incidents an attempt was made to get into a BMW car before they approached a Skoda Octavia.<\/p>\n

One of the defendants was said to have got into a rear seat, put his fingers against the driver\u2019s head and stated: \u201cI have a gun, drive.\u201d <\/p>\n

In a final hijacking on the Purdysburn Road, the owner of a Renault Clio was punched and threatened with being shot amid a struggle to take his vehicle.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Britain should allow EU to reopen Belfast office, says NI trade bodyOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Witnesses then reported seeing the stolen car being driven dangerously, with a passenger opening and closing doors while shouting \u201cup the hoods\u201d. <\/p>\n

The stolen Clio was later found abandoned and burnt out in the Beechmount Avenue area of Belfast.<\/p>\n

Some of the stolen cars were so badly damaged during the deliberate high-speed rammings that they had to be written off.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year the trial judge at Belfast Crown Court described it as one of the worst cases of hijacking he had encountered.<\/p>\n

Collins and Mateer were told their \u201cappalling morning of crime\u201d could have had catastrophic consequences.<\/p>\n

But the Public Prosecution Service<\/a> (PPS) referred the case back to the Court of Appeal on the grounds that the prison terms, split equally between custody and licence, were too lenient. It was claimed the judge made an error during the sentencing process.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Leaving post, but not leaving Ireland: the UK ambassador who is not going homeOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Granting the PPS appeal, Dame Siobhan held that the judge had strayed outside the appropriate range. \u201cWe are firmly of the view that both sentences were unduly lenient,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In her ruling the Chief Justice also stressed how multiple people had been injured in the hijacking spree, including one victim who sustained a broken wrist.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven the very serious nature of this offending, which had a serious impact on the public, it is entirely appropriate and proper for us to substitute the sentences outlined,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two men who \u201cterrorised\u201d other motorists during a hijacking spree across parts of Northern Ireland are to have…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55954,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[663,9,10,13,14,6,11,12,15,16,5,954,7,8,65,66,67],"class_list":{"0":"post-55953","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-belfast","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-latest-news","15":"tag-latestnews","16":"tag-main-news","17":"tag-mainnews","18":"tag-news","19":"tag-northern-ireland","20":"tag-top-stories","21":"tag-topstories","22":"tag-world","23":"tag-world-news","24":"tag-worldnews"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55953\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}