A self-confessed baby killer, currently serving a minimum 16 year life sentence, has been acquitted of entering the UK illegally.
Granting an appeal by Sharyar Ali at Newry County Appeal Court, Judge Gordon Kerr KC ruled out a confession by the 35-year-old because he was not properly cautioned by the police.
"It is absolutely clear from the tenor and tone of the questioning throughout the interview, taken as a whole, that this was an offence which was suspected by the police from the outset and one, which in those circumstances, he should have been cautioned for," the judge said.
"Not only should he have been cautioned for it, but upon admission, he should have been cautioned again and asked to repeat the admission concerned."
Defence counsel Michael Halleron had argued that the Crown could not prove when the Pakistani national had entered the UK.
Ali admitted murdering 11-month old Hunter McGleenon in November 2019 in Keady.
The Pakistani national had been in a relation with Hunter's mother Nicole and had been caring for the baby while she went to visit a sick relative.
Now with an address as Maghaberry prison but previously from Westerna Terrace in Monaghan, he was sentenced to a minimum of 13 years behind bars.
The PPS appealed that as “unduly lenient” given the vulnerabilities of his victim and the Court of Appeal increased the minimum tariff to 16 years.
A PPS lawyer had argued that Ali “had the care” of Hunter and highlighting that Ali “is serving a life sentence for the murder,” she told the court that during police interviews under caution, “he admits that he came here on the 26 November with the baby and the baby was murdered on 26 November when the baby had been in his care”.
Ali told police he had crossed the border to a casino in Monaghan and the lawyer argued that on the day Hunter died, “he came back north and took the baby back to Keady so he had to enter NI illegally”.