Opinion

Deserved sentence for Orhan Koca

After watching as Orhan Koca was taken to prison from Belfast crown court yesterday, Eamonn Magee senior was fully entitled to say; "No sentence imposed will ever bring back my son."

The murder of 22-year-old Eamonn Magee junior in the west of the city two years ago was a particularly shocking crime as it was clearly premeditated and involved inflicting extreme violence on an entirely innocent individual.

Koca (34), a Turkish national, discovered that his estranged wife was in a relationship with Mr Magee and waited outside his former family home in Twinbrook in the early hours of the morning armed with what police believe was a large kitchen knife.

When his victim stepped outside to check on a pizza delivery, he was stabbed six times, including twice to the chest, and died in hospital shortly afterwards.

Mr Magee was a well regarded student who was also so promising as a boxer that many observers expected that he would follow in the footsteps of his father and become a world champion.

Koca subsequently claimed that he thought there was an intruder in his former house, and had lifted a broken blade from a pair of shears in the back garden to defend himself before panicking, lashing out with the weapon and fleeing the scene.

Mr Justice Tracey dismissed this version of events as "wholly implausible", and concluded that Koca had been motivated by jealousy and deliberately planned to kill Mr Magee.

However, the judge noted that the defendant had spared the Magee family the ordeal of a trial through his guilty plea and ruled that he should serve a minimum of 14 years in jail.

While there will be enormous sympathy for the relatives and friends of Mr Magee, it should be accepted that Koca has been handed a very significant punishment after admitting a dreadful offence.

Anyone who uses a knife in the course of a brutal assault which has fatal consequences need to know that they will be losing their liberty for a substantial period.

The penalty handed down by Mr Justice Tracey after considering the traumatic evidence in Koca’s case should certainly have a deterrent effect on others and will be generally regarded as fully deserved.