Criminal Law Act, 1997

Powers of dealing with offenders.

10.—(1) Where a person is convicted on indictment of an offence against any enactment and is for that offence liable to be sentenced to imprisonment but the sentence is not by any enactment either limited to a specified term or expressed to extend to imprisonment for life, the person so convicted shall be liable to imprisonment for not more than two years.

(2) A person convicted on indictment of an attempt to commit an offence for which a maximum term of imprisonment or a maximum fine is provided by an enactment shall not be sentenced to imprisonment for a term longer, or a fine larger, than that which could be imposed for the completed offence.

(3) Where a person is convicted on indictment of any offence other than an offence for which the sentence is fixed by law, the court, if not precluded from doing so by its exercise of some other power, may impose a fine in lieu of or in addition to dealing with the offender in any other way in which the court has power to deal with him or her, subject however to any enactment limiting the amount of the fine that may be imposed or requiring the offender to be dealt with in a particular way.

(4) Notwithstanding anything in any enactment whereby power is conferred on a court, on the conviction of a person of an offence, to bind the offender over to keep the peace or to be of good behaviour, that power may be exercised without sentencing the offender to a fine or to imprisonment.

(5) A person sent forward to a court for sentence under section 13 (2) of the Criminal Procedure Act, 1967 with a plea of guilty of an offence may be dealt with in all respects as if he or she had been convicted on indictment of the offence by that court.