Jail for Cork man who kicked 'kind, good-natured' 69-year-old to death

A 28 year-old man has been jailed for 11 years after he kicked to death a kind and good-natured 69-year-old West Cork man who had approached him in a Cork city pub.

At the Central Criminal Court sitting in Cork, Ms Justice Siobhán Lankford set a headline sentence of 17 years mitigated to 12 years because of Aaron Wolfe’s plea of guilty to the manslaughter of Florence (Florrie) O’Sullivan on March 11 2023 at 15 Glentrasna Court, The Glen, Cork. 

The last year of that sentence was suspended on condition that he comply with directions of the probation service on his release. The sentence was backdated to March 2023 when he went into custody.

Ms Justice Lankford said: “Florence O’Sullivan was of a friendly, talkative disposition … His brother Paddy described him as a kind, good-natured person who never failed to help people in trouble and that his death does not just affect the family but the whole community … Mr O’Sullivan’s approach on the day appears to have been friendly and the attack appears to have been unprovoked. There does not appear to have been any bad blood between them.” 

One of hardest months of his life

The late Florrie O’Sullivan’s brother, Paddy O’Sullivan, said the time between hearing of that assault on his brother and his death in hospital as a result of his injuries on April 6, 2023 was one of the hardest months of his life.

He said he had many happy memories of the family’s life in Adrigole but he offered one more recent memory of his late brother: “I crashed my car and I could not afford to replace it. 

"Florrie said, ‘come up to the city and I’ll give you one’.” 

Sergeant Catriona Molloy said Aaron Wolfe was drinking alone in The Linen Weaver pub on Paul Street, Cork, from after 3pm on Saturday afternoon, March 11 2023. He was drinking pints of lager. 

Florrie O’Sullivan went to the same pub after 4pm for a cup of coffee and started talking to Aaron Wolfe, who was 28 at the time.

About an hour later they both left and got a taxi together to Glen Trasna in the Glen where Aaron Wolfe was living at the home of his grandmother, Eileen Karluk. They later went by taxi to Nutley Road in Mahon where Aaron Wolfe called to a relative.

It appeared that Mr O’Sullivan had left a bag at the house in Glen Trasna and returned by taxi with Aaron Wolfe to retrieve it. They arrived back at 7.38 p.m.. The taxi driver who dropped them said there was no sign of any animosity between them. There was evidence of Aaron Wolfe drinking Jägermeister in the taxis, as well as some six pints of lager in the pub.

By 8.15pm, gardaí were receiving calls about a violent assault taking place outside the house at Glen Trasna. 

One caller said: 

“There is a man thrown down on the ground covered in blood. There is a fella still kicking him on the ground. His name is Aaron.” 

Margaret Bolster assistant state pathologist concluded that Mr O'Sullivan died from traumatic brain injury due to blunt force trauma.

Questioned after the March incident, Aaron Wolfe said the deceased was not leaving the house or was not leaving fast enough when asked to go. 

The accused said there was an altercation in the house but that he (Aaron Wolfe) had a blackout and could not remember what happened outside the house.

Brendan Grehan, defence senior counsel, said there was no suggestion of any weapon being used, the parties did not know each other before this evening in March 2023 and nobody who saw them together described any animosity or raised voices or anything of that sort.

Mr Grehan said the accused instructed him to apologise and express his remorse to the O’Sullivan family, adding that he did not mean to kill him.

Mr Grehan said the accused had almost doubled in weight over the last three years in prison and now weighs 25 stone. He said there was no evidence of any psychiatric basis for a defence that could be put forward.

Aaron Wolfe has 78 previous convictions including one for engaging in a violent disorder in 2020 and an assault causing harm in 2016.