Ross Lyons

Before today's sentence was passed, Ashling Murphy's sister Amy told the court of the family's anger at the "injustice of it all" and the "staggering" public cost to pay for legal teams that could have been directed to "vital and underfunded services across Ireland". She said her family felt "gaslit" when barristers for each of the accused described their clients as holding family values and wanting to educate their children and create a better life for them. "How dare they speak those words?" she said. "Words they clearly don't live by and that their actions completely contradict." "Our parents worked incredibly hard to provide for us, to ensure we were educated and to instil in us a strong work ethic, integrity and moral responsibility. To sit there and hear those values twisted and used in defence of people who have demonstrated none of those qualities was infuriating. "It felt deeply insulting to Ashling, to our parents and to everything decent families stand for."