A man who continues to show no remorse for raping his wife has had his prison sentence cut on appeal.
The 43-year-old man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was unanimously found guilty of raping his wife in their home in May 2014 - making him the third person to be convicted for marital rape since rape within a marriage was made illegal in 1990.
A jury of 11 men and one woman also found him guilty of threatening to kill his wife and cut her face, having denied the charges.
He had admitted assaulting his wife with a hammer which he used to strike blows to her head.
Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy sentenced him to 12 years imprisonment with the final two suspended in June 2016.
The Court of Appeal heard that the man refuses to show any remorse for raping his wife and still does not accept the verdict of the jury. He successfully appealed his sentence today.
The Court ruled that a sentence of 10 or 11 years imprisonment appeared to be "somewhat out of kilter" for an individual instance of rape, even after a not guilty plea, where there had been no premeditation or unusual violence.
He was re-sentenced to 10 years imprisonment with the final 18 months suspended.
Dismissing his appeal against conviction in December - a judgment the man also does not accept - Mr Justice Alan Mahon said the man, originally from the Middle East, married his wife, an Irish national, in 2005.
They had one child and, following a year of maternity leave, the man's wife returned to work and ultimately received a promotion.
This resulted in greater time away from the family home and began to cause tensions within the relationship.
Mr Justice Mahon said a series of assaults and threats, including rape in the marital home, culminated in an attack by the man on his wife and her mother with a hammer.
Moving to appeal his sentence, the man's barrister, Ronan Munro SC, submitted Mr Justice Peter Charleton's guidance on sentencing for sexual offences in a case known as 'D(W)'.
Mr Munro said there had been no pre-meditation and no gratuitous violence (beyond the violence inherent in the rape itself) to justify a sentence of the order imposed on his client.
Mr Justice John Edwards said the Court of Appeal agreed that the sentence in this case, when viewed in isolation, appeared to be "somewhat out of kilter with sentences imposed in comparable cases" even though the circumstances of the case were "egregious" and the crime was "very serious".
However, he said the man could not avail of the most powerful mitigating factor available, namely a guilty plea and expressions of genuine remorse.
The man still does not accept the verdict of the jury nor the Court of Appeal's dismissal of his appeal against conviction, the judge said.
